Lyft driver Gayle Gregory Goodman is basically making a living via Philadelphians’ hatred of parking.
She starts her day off driving at 4:30 a.m. around her home in Delco and for the first few hours takes commuters from their homes to SEPTA Regional Rail stations where parking is limited. As she inches closer to the city, she begins dropping off passengers directly at their places of employment.
“They say, ‘I can’t afford to park down there,’” Gregory Goodman said. “And if they end up parking down there they end up with a $75 ticket.”
Lyft Philly GM Andrew Woolf confirmed that a significant portion of Lyft’s business comes from people who don’t want to park their cars. This has become a trend for commuters elsewhere, too, so much so that office landlords in New Jersey are beginning to offer Lyft and Uber subsidies.
Much of the time, these trips to avoid parking are to the airport or SEPTA stations, but Lyft is used for far more routine parking jobs. Like for a friend of Woolf’s in Queen Village.
“He has a car, finds a great spot for it, but doesn’t want to give up that spot,” Woolf said. “So he uses [Lyft] to run local errands to not worry about parking.”
Gregory Goodman is fine giving rides to other who don’t want to park. But she’d never avoid parking herself. Her M.O. for trips in Center City is finding a spot around Franklin Square and then taking the Center City Phlash to anywhere too far to walk.
“Oh yeah,” she said, “I park in the city….I street park. I know where to go. I usually go right around Sixth and Race. I hope people don’t know that.”
Avoid wet cement in Manayunk
Over at Terrace and Ridge in Manayunk, this driver found out the wet cement sign really means wet cement. Maybe still worth it for the parking spot though.
The underground parking economy
Seems like a fair trade…
