Actually, I absolutely do. I've gone on many trips that I simply wouldn't have gone on pre-Uber. On a regular basis I'll decide to go somewhere (ex. a party in Brooklyn) which I wouldn't have bothered with if it meant a slow and unreliable taxi (or an even slower subway ride).
However, if you go from Manhattan to Queens you'll find they sometimes suddenly "forget" how to get there despite 90% of them living in Queens because they won't reliably get a return fare. Same in the rest of the boroughs.
Also they often have "broken" credit card readers that magically get repaired after fighting with them.
The cars are not always in the best condition. The other day I rode in a cab that had no suspension it seemed. Every bump in the road would send you flying. It was a nauseating experience, let me tell you.
I still take taxis from time to time, especially when there's no real price difference or when I don't want to wait. A late night flight I might take an Uber to the airport and a taxi back if the wait time is too long.
With Uber and Lyft I generally get clean cars with suspensions and don't have to worry about paying them (Already handled!), refusing service, etc.
Although you get bad service from time to time in all transportation providers, Uber and Lyft tend to be much more consistent.
The only time I felt unsafe inside the car was when my driver drove with his elbows, with the Uber app in one hand and his wife on a different phone in the other hand. He just honked and cut across 3 lanes of traffic on El Camino on Mountain View. He told me later that he used to drive a taxi for years. I chalked it down as a cool story to tell people.later.
OP was talking about a destination you would go to in an Uber, but not a taxi.
> wouldn't have gone on pre-Uber ... I wouldn't have bothered with if it meant a slow and unreliable taxi
They would go to that destination in an Uber, but wouldn't bother in a taxi.
In the Bay Area and New York City, for me, this is untrue. Distances feel smaller when you can cross them with the press of a button. That, in turn, makes peripatetic schedules realistic.
Case in point: I took a Lyft Line from Berkeley to Mountain View yesterday. If that wasn't an option, I would have (a) taken the train or (b) not gone that far.
In the past I've helped tourists by directing them to these locations which aren't noted anywhere. So it can be really confusing plus inconvenient.
That's one of the reasons I like Uber and the like: I don't have to know what to do.
If getting from A to B is time consuming and expensive then I might not bother unless it's really important. By lowering the costs of getting from A to B I might do it more often than I would otherwise.
My demand for travel is somewhat elastic, not completely set before I know the cost of travel.
Personally, I just don't have many situations where I would make a trip but my available alternatives are just a bit too costly/inconvenient--while Uber wouldn't be. But I understand they exist.