Colorado Rider Safety Bill Provides Unintended Consequences Without Real Protections

Last week, the Colorado General Assembly passed HB1291 to impose regulations on transportation network companies (TNCs). While this bill has been marketed as a means to address public safety concerns, its text fails to address consumer safety in any meaningful way. Instead, the bill puts undue burden on TNCs that far exceeds the requirements of other methods of transportation in the state. These burdens threaten to cause TNCs to abandon the Colorado market entirely, which would not only restrict the transportation choices available to consumers but would also jeopardize the future deployment of beneficial innovations like highly autonomous vehicles in the Centennial State.

Previous analysis from the R Street Institute raised concerns about HB1291 in relation to the potential for increased costs, reduced rideshare availability, unnecessary barriers to employment, and civil liberty concerns. This analysis will highlight the overall failure of HB1291 to address safety concerns meaningfully, the arbitrary distinction HB1291 draws between transportation providers, and the imposition of significant and costly data transmission and storage requirements on drivers and TNCs.

While ensuring rider safety is a commendable goal, HB1291 provides no meaningful guarantee of safety to consumers. Instead, the bill levies requirements on TNCs that vastly exceed those of other transportation services. Further, any potential safety benefits of recording audio and/or video of rides are nullified by the ability of both drivers and passengers to opt out.

Arbitrary Distinctions Between Transportation Operators

HB1291 requires TNCs to leverage privately administered criminal history checks for drivers every six months. This requirement stands in stark contrast to similar transportation methods (e.g., taxis), where drivers must submit fingerprints to the Federal Bureau of Investigation upon initial employment, with certification renewed at the discretion of the Colorado Public Utilities Commission. HB1291 explains the new requirement by noting that “[t]he cost of a background check is negligible compared to the multibillion-dollar net worth and profit of the industry.” This sets a double standard between TNC drivers and drivers of vehicles, such as taxis, school buses, and limousines, simply because TNCs are profitable. But taxis and limousines are also presumably profitable, suggesting that lawmakers see TNC drivers as somehow more dangerous than those who provide other forms of transportation.

In addition to levying different requirements on operators performing similar services, the bill distinguishes between classes of TNCs themselves based upon how much of their business involves the transportation of minors. Companies that primarily provide transportation for children are not required to comply with large portions of the bill that contain supposed consumer safeguards, which raises a pertinent question: Why would the safety measures within this bill not apply to those transporting children as much as those transporting adults?

Optional Methods for Safety and Associated Costs

In addition to mandating semi-annual background checks to certain types of TNCs, HB1291 proposes that TNCs record and store audio and video of every ride as a safety measure. While cameras have not exactly proven effective in deterring criminal behavior, they can provide a means to hold those who break the law accountable. But HB1291 devalues video and/or audio recording as a deterrent or accountability method by allowing both riders and drivers to opt out, thereby nullifying any consumer safety provided by the bill. (Those who would harm a rider or driver are unlikely to consent to being recorded in the first place.)

Even if drivers and riders were unable to opt out of audio and/or video recording, HB1291’s recording requirement would demand a significant amount of data transfer and storage. This would put a significant cost burden on TNCs and their drivers.

TNC drivers already experience high monthly data usage on their personal devices without streaming audio or video for every ride. It is not unreasonable to estimate that drivers would need to stream several hours of audio and/or video to central TNC data centers or cloud storage providers each workday. The increased mobile data requirement associated with video and audio streaming would necessitate unlimited data plans and subject drivers’ devices to data throttling—common after passing a certain usage threshold.

Beyond drivers, TNCs would be required to store data for a period of 30 days after each ride unless there is a complaint or active law enforcement investigation. In these cases, they would be required to store the data for a year or more. This would require petabytes of storage in either TNC data centers or cloud environments, resulting in significant costs to TNCs and consumers.

Conclusion

While well intended, HB1291 falls short in its goal to protect consumers of transportation services. Instead, it holds specific TNCs to a higher standard than other transportation options in the state. Further, the bill would require TNCs to make massive investments in data storage and management infrastructure to support audio and/or video stream storage and require drivers to use even more mobile data. Ultimately, the bill allows both riders and drivers to opt out of being recorded, thereby removing the deterrence and accountability mechanism that is a key pillar of the legislation.

If Colorado lawmakers want to protect consumers, they must do so in a fair and equitable manner, resisting the urge to single out any particular mode of transport. If signed into law, HB1291 would harm consumers and stifle innovation in the state without improving overall safety in a meaningful way.