UBER announced that they’re making it easier for festival-goers at Coachella to find an UBER ride back to their hotel rooms.
During any other week in the Indio/Palm Springs area you can easily find an UBER driver thanks to the town’s easy going pace. But come mid-April you’ll find an influx of over 62,000 festival-goers, all attending the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. According to The Desert Sun on how the city of Indio and management at Coachella is handling transportation for all these people (Mar. 26, 2017) it looks like they’ve struck a deal with UBER to get people a ride as soon as possible at the cheapest rates available, much to the chagrin of drivers.
According to Coachella,
“A coordinated taxi and Uber stand will operate Fri – Sun from 9am – 3am at Ave. 49 and Monroe. Just follow the Yellow Path to and from the festival.
Uber customers can relax in the shade and charge your phones in the Uber Lounge while waiting for your Uber to arrive.”
That means UBER has found much success with it’s “First In, First Out” system of getting passenger’s a ride. The passengers will wait in line and when they reach the front, they’ll get a unique pin, at which point they’ll hand that pin to the UBER driver. The UBER driver will enter that pin into their app and the fare will start from there.
For drivers they’ll have to pick up whomever is in line regardless if they don’t have a rating suitable to the driver’s standards. This also means that UBER drivers will most likely always be available and will eliminate surge-like pricing. Drivers may benefit from an event multiplier but can’t cash in on a large bonus just because of an event’s popularity.
For passengers this means there’ll always be an UBER at hand, you can’t choose who you accept as a driver but it does mean that overall you’ll have a cheaper fare.
For a full rundown of all the transportation options available during festival weekend, click here.
UBER INFO ABOUT ROAD CLOSURE SEEM TO CONFLICT WITH BOTH COACHELLA MUSIC FESTIVAL INFORMATION AS WELL AS WITH ANNOUNCED ROAD CLOSURES BY THE LOCAL TV STATIONS.