Uber has often been criticized for the lack of easily available wheelchair accessible rides. Those who were looking for one often had to wait for a long time before they got a wheelchair accessible car. The company is making amends now with a new partnership with MV Transportation. It’s a paratransit service provider that operates in 30 states as well as Canada.
Uber’s latest partnership adds hundreds of wheelchair accessible cars to its network. This means that those who want to get a ride in such a vehicle will be able to get one in under 15 minutes. This will initially be the case across six markets which include Boston, New York City, Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Toronto.
Riders can expect to wait 15 minutes or less for a wheelchair accessible vehicle on average. Uber aims to cut the average wait times over the next year with riders in markets like Los Angeles and San Francisco to 15 minutes. According to the ride hailing service, these eight cities account for almost half of all Uber trips in North America.
All of the rides will be operated in vehicles that are owned by MV. Their trained drivers will operate them. The cost for each ride will be the same as the cost of an UberX.