Ride-Sharing Apps Gaining In Popularity, But New York City's Taxi Industry Is 'Far From Dead'

Adam Jonas of Morgan Stanley took a deep dive into the taxi and ride-sharing space to see exactly how much of a disruption Uber and Lyft are to the traditional taxi industry.

Jonas' new "Taxi and Ride-share App Monitor" (TRAM) examines the detailed monthly report from New York City's Taxi & Limousine Commission for trips carried out by its Yellow Taxis and For Hire Vehicles (VHVs), such as Uber and Lyft.

Uber, Lyft and other ride-sharing apps are required to submit records that detail the total number of trips and vehicles dispatched.

Jonas noted that this data will be updated regularly.

Related Link: New Data Show Uber Is The Most Dominant Ride-Sharing App

The first month of data examined was April 2016. The information gathered by Jonas showed that Uber is "by far the most dominant" of the ride-sharing apps with a 121 percent year-over-year growth and 4.718 million total dispatched trips.

Despite an 871 percent year-over-year growth in total dispatched trips, Lyft's drivers only dispatched 749,910 trips. Via ranked third with 441,297 dispatched trips, following by Gett's 134,691 dispatched trips.

On the other hand, the total number of dispatched trips by traditional taxis was approximately twice as many as the 4 ride-sharing apps combined at 11.137 million.

The average licensed taxi driver in New York City conducted on average 91 trips per week which outranks Uber's 44 rides a week, Lyft's 23 rides a week and GETT's 20 rides a week.

However, Via drivers outrank taxi drivers with an average of 108 trips per week.

Bottom line, Jonas suggested that the New York City's taxi industry is "far from dead" and "still perform a vast majority of trips in the city." In addition, New York City's taxis complete more trips with under half the total number of Uber vehicles on the road.