At the beginning of March, the City and Borough of Juneau penned a letter to Rep. Sam Kito, laying out its concerns about a proposed bill that would bring ride-sharing companies such as Uber and Lyft to Alaska.
City Manager Rorie Watt, who wrote the letter, didn’t receive any acknowledgement from Kito or the Legislature about the city’s concerns, and both the House and the Senate passed the legislation. The bill doesn’t allow for local governments to regulate the way these Transportation Network Companies (TNCs) operate in their communities, and now it’s on Gov. Bill Walker’s desk for final approval.
“What we basically got was the legislation that Uber wanted,” Watt said.
On Thursday, Watt wrote another letter, this time to Walker. It expresses the city’s concerns once again, mainly centering around the effects TNCs would have at the cruise dock and the Juneau International Airport. It also goes along with a letter that the Alaska Municipal League sent Walker this Tuesday urging him to veto the bill.
[Legislature allows Uber, Lyft to operate in Alaska]
The issue of local control is at the heart of Juneau’s concerns, as Watt’s letter in March stated that Juneau “believes that regulating local transportation is a local issue.” The legislation currently prohibits a municipality from regulating the way TNCs operate.
City officials have been talking with officials from Uber recently, trying to explain the unique aspects of Juneau’s transportation landscape. With a fairly small area and very little parking, the market is already saturated.
Watt hopes this becomes clear next week, when officials from Uber will be in town. Uber spokesperson Nathan Hambley didn’t mention who exactly will be visiting on Uber’s behalf, but made it clear that Uber fully expects to operate soon in Juneau.
“Members of our team will be in Juneau over the coming weeks meeting with drivers and others to make sure our launch there is successful for drivers, riders and the city,” Hambley said via email.
Uber officials are expected to be in Juneau on Tuesday, to meet with staff from City Hall, Docks &Harbors and the Juneau International Airport. Those two aspects of Juneau — its docks and its airport — are at the heart of the city’s concerns with Uber.
The cruise dock, located downtown, welcomes thousands of cruise passengers every day during the summer. Downtown Juneau already has a parking shortage, and some city officials believe that adding TNCs into the mix would only make that worse.
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If Walker passes this legislation, Uber and Lyft will immediately be able to operate in Juneau. Uber has already reached out via text message to people throughout Alaska, saying that Uber will be coming to the state in June and inviting people to sign up to be drivers. Watt pointed out that this new influx of drivers would happen in the middle of Juneau’s tourist season, and could result in traffic issues.
Hambley explained Thursday that Uber usually alleviates parking issues in cities, because many local people end up using Uber instead of their own car. The Uber cars themselves are usually in motion too, Hambley pointed out.
Another distinctive concern that the city has is related to the airport. The city owns and operates the Juneau International Airport, making it the only international airport in the state that the Alaska Department of Transportation doesn’t run. CBJ Attorney Amy Mead said space at the airport is at a premium as is for cabs and shuttle buses, and that it’s vital for airports to be able to work with those companies.
“When a plane comes in or is leaving, it becomes an area of intensified use in a really short period of time and then it’s gone,” Mead said. “It’s really important that the airport be able to manage that kind of an intense use so that it ensures that everyone can get to where they need to go.”
The airport’s Board of Directors approved a proposal last week that charges TNCs $3 per trip to the airport in addition to a $100 annual fee to operate at the airport. This proposal will undergo one more review from the board before going to the CBJ Assembly for final approval at its June 26 meeting.
While city officials are dreading Uber’s arrival, many people throughout Alaska have responded positively, Hambley said. During a meeting discussing the bill in February, Watt and others on the Assembly said they didn’t necessarily think that bringing TNCs to Alaska was bad. They felt then and they’re expressing in their letter this week that they merely want their concerns about the compnaies’ fit in Juneau to be taken into account.
“We were just trying to say, ‘Hey, we’re not opposed in concept, but we have these special needs,’” Watt said. “‘Can we please accomodate them?”
• Contact reporter Alex McCarthy at alex.mccarthy@juneauempire.com.
