Uber Air

[43Inches]

I think the difference is that radios don't generally cause harm, damage or injury. All CASA has to do is have rules in place that if somebody is not legally operating the drone then it's no longer a CASA matter, it becomes a criminal matter and goes straight to law enforcement and the courts. If you cause damage to property or persons in the process and are operating illegally, good luck in court. That's what stops the majority of people building their own cars and/or driving unregistered, except for those who have nothing to lose anyway...

The problem UBER drivers have is the lack of legal protection, because they operate in a grey area they also are insured in a grey area. As damage and liability insurance costs mount for these drivers that will push their costs above taxi operators as they have agreements and policies in place to keep those sort of costs down, as well as some states having industry generated insurance, maintenance, policing all managed by their own taxi 'directorate'. CPVs are road rash magnets, as well as the liability insurance claims that will start to occur as people are injured, are late for work, etc etc... UBER themselves are smart, the driver wears it all, not to mention the lease rate on vehicles in climbing as well as the vehicles themselves costing more.

If you havn't noticed yet car insurance has been climbing faster than CPI or recent.

[tail wheel]

If you haven't noticed yet car insurance has been climbing faster than CPI or recent.

Yes, my car insurance has doubled in three years, despite never having an accident or lodged a claim in 64 years licenced driving (and the previous 4 years un-licenced driving) and my home insurance has trebled in the past four years - despite the insurance industry being one of the most tightly regulated industries in Australia which has managed to form an Australian industry cartel without even raising an eye brow in Government halls.

Which supports my view that despite the best bureaucratic efforts and legislation, free enterprise and public demand will almost always win.

[pilot101486]

Originally Posted by Mr Proach

Why can't the aviation transport industry adopt an Uber platform and bypass the regulator just like what occurred in the Taxi industry? If nothing else, the advent of Uber proved beyond any doubt that regulators have no legitimacy. Like most regulators, this was a massive institution of people (including extremely well remunerated bureaucrats) who, for decades have controlled the Taxi industry. Then someone creates a programming code for a mobile device to provide an identical publicly available Taxi service which, was allowed to freely operate outside of the exisiting "Taxi" transport regulations. These so called regulators that allowed to this happen most likely walked away with massive (publicly financed) pay outs and have never been held to account for their complicity in what ultimately destroyed the livelihood of thousands of people and their assets.
Interestingly, in the recently well publicised court case "win" against Uber, there was no mention of the regulator's culpability in the whole affair. The reported award will only amount to about 5% of what an individual's taxi plate was worth prior to the proliferation of Uber. Doesn't what happened to a government regulated taxi industry mean that Government regulators/authorities (and their rules) are invalid?

For the EU, I found this in the Annex to Safety Charter non-commercial General Aviation:
EU safety regulations only permit cost-shared flights by private individuals, if the direct cost (i.e. cost directly incurred in relation to the flight, e.g. fuel, airfield charges, rental fee for an aircraft) are shared between all parties, including the pilot. Cost-shared flights shall not have an element of profit. If a flight is not a cost-shared flight in accordance with EU safety regulations, the flight will be qualified as a commercial flight and commercial air operation rules will apply.