After the ride-sharing firms pulled out of Austin in a battle over background checks, drivers and riders needing a lift now contact each other peer-to-peer

It was less than one week after Uber and Lyft pulled out of the city of Austin – and a crowdsourced ride-sharing alternative began to emerge.



In May, voters in the Texas capital rejected a proposal that would have overturned a city council measure forcing ride-sharing companies to require fingerprint-based background checks for drivers. Uber and Lyft lost despite a vicious $9m lobbying and publicity campaign by the two ride-sharing companies, which included a recall effort against the legislator who proposed the measure.



In response, both companies pulled their operations from Austin, perhaps hoping that the people of the city, starved of the convenience of their ride-sharing apps, would try to overturn the measure at a later date.



But they appear to have underestimated the people of Austin.



Organizing through a 32,000-member Facebook group called Arcade City Austin, drivers and riders now contact each other peer-to-peer, with riders posting to the group when they need a lift. Drivers post their time of arrival, and riders then connect over Facebook and exchange phone numbers; both parties have ample opportunity to evaluate each other for safety, proponents say.



There is no formal payment structure in place. Some individual drivers set prices when responding to requests; others choose to leave it up to the rider to pay what they believe the service was worth – or whatever they can afford.



Solomon Hapshire is an early adopter of Arcade City who used to drive for Lyft in his spare time before the company pulled out of Austin. At first, he was driving in order to put money aside for his wedding next year but quickly fell in love with driving people around.



With Arcade City … they are more than just a ping – they’re a person Solomon Hapshire

He said that he makes more money now from driving with Arcade City, with no set pricing, than he did driving with an app that prices by the mile. “It’s not ‘you’re driving this far for this much’, you are bringing a personal experience to someone, and they understand that,” he said. “It’s you choosing to help them, and them choosing to help you.”



“With Lyft and Uber you’re driving ’round in circles waiting for the ping,” Hapshire said. “You don’t know who this person is, all you know is it’s a ping on the map. With Arcade City … they are more than just a ping – they’re a person.”

Hapshire told the story of one of his regular clients, who is blind and relies on him to get to work. “I give him at least three rides a week,” he said. “Sometimes he pays me a good amount, sometimes he pays me [just] what he can, but it doesn’t matter, because I’m helping.” The two have become good friends, Hapshire said.



Arcade City was founded on New Year’s Eve in New Hampshire as a project that aims to decentralize ride-sharing, according to Chris Winston, Arcade City’s director of regions.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest Campaign signs concerning the Austin vote over fingerprint requirements for Uber and Lyft. Photograph: Reuters

It is unclear yet whether Arcade City can scale into places where Uber and Lyft operate, but there is no doubt that it has truly found its footing in Austin. Winston estimated that the Facebook group was facilitating at least 21,000 rides a week with roughly 1,400 drivers – an estimate he said was very conservative.

“Did they expect that the city would dissolve [without them]? It’s hard to say,” Winston said. “But why leave to come back? You have citizens that need to get to the airport, to the hospital.”

“If people aren’t going to play nice, or cooler heads don’t prevail, does that mean you cut a whole city off?” he added.

The two ride-share companies – which Winston describes as a duopoly – badly miscalculated if they thought Austin would clamor for their return. “Now people are saying ‘we don’t want Uber to come back, we’re doing fine’,” he said.



An Arcade City app is in the works, though it has not yet launched, and seven Austin drivers have been selected to begin trialling a beta version – Hapshire is one of them.



Another is Natalie Williams, who drove for both Uber and Lyft before they left town. She enjoyed it but much prefers Arcade City. Partly, she said, because Uber and Lyft don’t have preferred driver or passengers lists, “you don’t know who you’re going to get – you might get somebody male if you’re a female, and you don’t feel comfortable.”



But more than that, Arcade City was bringing people together, Williams said. “It was very impersonal with Uber and Lyft; now we’re taking care of each other.” She said that recently she got out of bed in the middle of the night to pick up a young woman “where it seemed like this young lady was in an uncomfortable situation”. Williams picked her up and took her home. “We talked, I gave her advice.”



Like Hapshire, Williams said that despite the donation system she had no problems making as much of a living as she had been from Uber and Lyft. “There are some people who bid low, there are others who have bid high,” she said. “I’ve been lucky to have amazing and generous passengers who are really appreciative.”