Uber lobbyists meet with Wheel-Trans
Uber’s head office in Toronto. Photo: Taxi News
In-house lobbyists for Uber logged a meeting on January 20 with the TTC’s Head of Wheel-Trans, Cameron Penman and Wheel-Trans Manager, Mohammed Rashid Shaikh. The TTC’s Manager of Business Transformation also attenderd, according to Matt Elliott, publisher of “City Hall Watcher.”
Elliott notes that Wheel-Trans provides a significant portion of its service to people with disabilities via contracts with the taxi industry. They have never established any similar arrangement with PTC companies like Uber, though Uber does operate a service called UberWav in some cities that provides specialized wheelchair-accessible service.
Attending the meeting from Uber was Senior Account Executive for Transit Partnerships Matthew Di Taranto and Head of Public Transit Partnerships Dmitry Vanchugov.
Before joining Uber in April last year, Elliott reports, Di Taranto worked for the TTC for more than five years, starting as a customer service representative and later as a dispatcher. In other Uber lobbying news, Senior Manager of Public Policy Jake Brockman logged a meeting on January 9 with Councillor Shelley Carroll to discuss Uber’s business in broader terms.
Taxi News coverage of the damage done by Uber to Toronto’s Accessible Taxi market was covered by the Toronto Star last summer.
