It is now possible to take an Uber in Canary Islands. The car rental company with driver -which has a presence in five other regions of the country- started operating yesterday in the Archipelago, but for now its service will only be available in the Tenerife municipalities of Granadilla de Abona, Arona, Adeje and Guide from Isora. Although it plans to expand in the future to the rest of the island and also disembark in Gran Canaria. The company does so with confidence about the success it can have in the Islands. Only last year, 70,000 people tried to contract a service through its application in one of the two capital islands.
The service began operating yesterday in the four municipalities, in addition to the airport of Tenerife Sur, through two formats: one provided by taxis and another premium with high-end vehicles. For the latter, the company already has 30 cars and regarding the former, it encourages taxi drivers to start working with its application. The journeys will continue to be paid according to the taximeter but those who join will also have other incentives.
The general director of Uber of Spain and Portugal, Felipe Fernández, explains that the reason for having chosen the south of Tenerife for its first implementation in the Canary Islands was based on several factors, such as the increase in the number of visitors that has been experienced at the start of this year and the forecast that the rise will continue this season. In addition, the presence of potential customers was higher than the other capital island, since 50,000 people tried to book a service from Tenerife last year. “Now we will analyze the evolution of both the number of operations and the number of drivers, taxis and user interest to later make the leap to the entire island and to Gran Canaria”, he details.
Fernández explains it was decided to implement the premium service, called Uber Black, when they disembarked in the Islands since the regulations in the Archipelago facilitate the granting of licenses associated with high-end vehicles that exceed 50,000 euros.
The Canary Islands Road Transport Regulation Law establishes a VTC limitation – which is the license that any private vehicle that wants to operate through platforms such as Uber must apply for – for every 30 taxis. A ratio that Fernández acknowledges complicates his expansion in the Canary Islands. “What it causes is that there is a lack of transport and a change is necessary,” he points out, before adding that the company will always operate “under legal frameworks.”
political concern
However, A recent ruling by the European Court of Justice determined that the Spanish limitation on driver-driven transport vehicle licenses is contrary to Community law. After that, the Ministry of Public Works, Transport and Housing of the canarian government referred to the councils -the institutions that have the powers in land transport- that the quota was still in force in the Canary Islands, since this restriction does not only serve economic reasons here but the need to regulate transport in an insular and outermost territory.
Yesterday the general director of Uber of Spain and Portugal pointed out that The company closely follows the application of this ruling in the country but ruled out that the landing of the company in the Canary Islands has now occurred for this reason. “We have been working on it for months,” he said.
Even so, the acting president of the Council of TenerifePedro Martín, expressed his concern and stressed that the necessary measures must be adopted to guarantee a regulation of VTC licenses that avoids a massive entry into the Islands. Currently, according to the ratio that is still in force, there are only 85 licenses authorized on the Island but 2,350 applications for new licenses have been submitted that have been denied based on this limitation.
