The VTA claimed the ridehailing companies are “just another type of taxi,” and that traditional taxi companies were being put in a significant disadvantage. They argued the PTB had not performed its due diligence of putting greater weight on the negative impact to taxi businesses.
Their petition focused on the lack of ridehailing fleet size limits, and asserted that “the [taxi] industry had basically no notice that ride-hailing would be introduced in a totally unregulated fashion.”
However, Justice Sandra Wilkinson’s written ruling on Wednesday sided with the PTB, Uber, and Lyft, concluding that nothing in the regulatory authority’s “reasoning is obviously untenable, clearly irrational, evidently not in accordance with reason, almost bordering on the absurd, or so flawed that no amount of curial deference can justify letting it stand.”