Uber landed in Florence, taxi drivers protest

Uber Black also operates in Florence. But taxi drivers warn: “Ready to report arrivals from outside Florence.” The news of an Uber landing in town arrived in the morning. After Milan, Rome, Bologna and Turin, the company “continues its expansion plan”. Thus in Florence “the uber van will also be active, to allow users to travel together with a maximum of 4 people, as required under the anti-coronavirus regulations”.
The move to Florence was also illustrated by a fact: in 2021 “the uber app was opened more than 140,000 times in Florence to check the availability of rides in the city. And in the pre-Covid era, the numbers were even higher: in fact, in 2019, the number of sessions reached about 750,000.” According to Lorenzo Peredo, President of Italian Uber, “The arrival of our service represents an important development in the path of expanding the offer of our products and services in Italy, and it is taking place at a time of low season precisely to support the transportation business. We will continue to work to propose our platform for mobility in more and more cities. Italian, so that more and more people can organize their trips directly from our app in a reliable and safe way.”

The ad, however, puts the world of white cars on hiatus. “If we all work according to the same rules, we will not be worried about the arrival of uber. If the authorities were to apply to all operators laws and principles to protect users who dominate what remains a public service in Italy, then it will happen. Already in 2016: that attempt failed in Uber after ten Only months ”, said the national president of the uritaxi, Claudio Giudice. However, if it is “allowed to work despite the rules, both cab drivers and taxi drivers in Florence will not hesitate to inform the relevant municipalities of the people who will flock to Florence en masse, rather than work for the communities from the lands from which they are allowed” , is a promise. Giudici concluded: “We will not allow the New York model to take root in Florence and Italy.”

The reaction of private NCC drivers is different. “As a consortium of NCC based in Florence, we have nothing against the arrival of Uber Black, but what we expect is to operate according to the same rules, otherwise we will have to talk about unfair competition,” Franco Gianni, Consorzio Ncc CEO CapCosepuri Firenze comments With more than 40 associated companies, Confcooperative Toscana Nord rep for the transportation sector, on landing Uber Black in the Tuscan capital. “If the idea is to allow us to work on equal terms – continues Franco Giani – we support the access of Uber and the use of applications that are useful to citizens, but on the other hand we declare that we are immediately ready to report to the relevant municipalities and jurisdictions are those that claim to flow into Florence and its province with mandates from Other regions are in their pockets, and we will do it for the benefit of the citizens.” “We are – and he asserts – authorized to work here, as required by law, asking not to allow others to come and work in this field without the necessary permits. This would be unfair to those who do such work while respecting all the rules, and whoever allows it shall be their partner.”