Sen. Krueger re-iterated her stance that the law as written was indeed directed towards the type of rental activity that takes place on sharing and vacation rental sites. Airbnb has stated that 87% of its hosts are renting the units they live in, but the senator argues that a much larger portion of the activity on these sites is carried out by unscrupulous agencies and landlords than the sites would have users believe.

A portion of her statement follows:

The real problem here is the devil-may-care attitude companies like Airbnb have taken toward the legal consequences for their users. Whether it’s laws like New York’s, or it’s the basic terms of use of a potential user’s apartment, companies like Airbnb or Flipkey are recruiting private citizens into their business model without sufficiently warning them that it may not be legal and could even lose them their homes. That’s pathologically irresponsible.

New York’s law deals with a serious problem — our city’s chronic residential housing shortage has reached a crisis level. The bulk of listings on Airbnb and similar services in New York City are not individuals or small entrepreneurs renting out one or two rooms from time to time to supplement their income — they are large, ongoing illegal business enterprises taking residential apartments entirely out of the market and using them as unsafe, illegal hotel rooms. This is bad for visitors, who don’t get proper services, safety, or security in these illegal accommodations, and bad for New Yorkers, who are suffering under a housing shortage and can’t afford to have residential apartments illegally taken out of the market.

I am open to discussing good-faith efforts to improve our law, but the only proposals that have been put forward so far would gut the law, making it practically unenforceable and leaving New Yorkers without any recourse against illegal hotel operations compromising the safety and security of their homes.

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Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky (center) with fellow co-founders Nathan Blecharczyk (left) and Joe Gebbia. No, they are not couch-surfing. / Airbnb

In the wake of Airbnb moving to a Verified ID system to enhance trust between hosts and prospective guests, NBCNews.com’s Ben Popken spoke with Airbnb co-founder and CEO Brian Chesky about trust and security, and what the new feature means for the evolution of Airbnb. Skift reprints the interview with permission.

NBC NEWS: How does anonymity erode trust?

CHESKY: We believe that when you remove anonymity, it brings out the best in people. It creates more accountability and gives our users more confidence when they’re booking a trip.

NBC: How do you design trust?

CHESKY: The first wave of the web was all about getting online. The second wave was about connecting online (social media, Facebook). Now, we’re on the precipice of a third wave, one that’s about taking those online connections and manifesting them in the real world. Airbnb is unique because it links online interactions with offline experiences. The ways that we build trust in our marketplace have to do the same. Verified ID is innovative because of the way it links online identity with offline identification. Imagine confirming your Facebook account when you checked in a hotel. That’s the direction we’re headed.

NBC: When you talk about trust, are you talking not just about trust between users, but also how external parties — landlords, regulators, legislators and media — trust your service and those who use it?

CHESKY: Airbnb is about access. We provide access to meaningful experiences in local places all over the world — places that weren’t easily accessible before. Trust is the currency that powers those experiences, and when you build more trust, you can provide more access. As pioneers of the sharing economy, our community expects us to innovate at a speed that matches our growth.

NBC: The last big round of trust-enhancing service additions in 2011 were reactive, borne out of crisis control. Is it fair to say that the latest move is an attempt to lock the service down more before blowing the scale out?

CHESKY: The fundamentals of trust on Airbnb have existed since the beginning of the company: our secure payment structure, detailed profiles, and authentic review system. In 2011 we added the $50,000 Host Guarantee, 24/7 Customer Service, and over 40 trust features. In 2012 we upped the Host Guarantee to $1 Million. Verified ID is the latest innovation in our ongoing commitment to trust.

NBC: Of the reservations that now require offline identity verification, what percentage have been abandoned due to incomplete ID registration?

CHESKY: The early feedback from our community has been very positive. Our team worked hard to make the Verified ID product as seamless and easy-to-use as possible.

NBC: What is your current number of 24/7 support reps?

CHESKY: We have built a dedicated Trust team that works to protect our community from fraud and build trust in the user experience.

NBC: If Verified ID is the foundation, what are the next steps, or categories of steps, towards increasing trust?

CHESKY: Trust isn’t static — it’s built over time. We’re always working to innovate new products that build trust on Airbnb. In the early days of the Web, anonymity was prevalent, but we feel the Web is moving away from that. Real identification will eventually become the standard. There is no place for anonymity in the future of Airbnb or the sharing economy.

Read the full NBCNews.com story here.

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But bike sharing is finally coming to the Big Apple, which could help the city overcome its reputation as a commuter obstacle course of speeding cabbies, horn-honking drivers and sharp-elbowed pedestrians who treat crossing signals as a mere suggestion.

City officials say the nation’s largest bike-sharing system will begin sometime this month with 6,000 bikes at 330 stations in Manhattan and parts of Brooklyn, with plans to expand eventually to 10,000 bikes and 600 docking stations in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens.

“When you talk about scale, no other U.S. city comes close,” says Jon Orcutt, policy director at the city’s Department of Transportation, which is overseeing the launch of the program.

Officials hope the privately funded bike-sharing program, dubbed Citi Bike after a $41 million sponsorship from Citibank and an additional $6.5 million from MasterCard, will add riders to the more than 700 miles of bike lanes throughout New York and will be used by one-way commuters and round-trip tourists alike.

The idea is that bike-sharing programs decrease the number of drivers on the road and encourage healthy lifestyles, a particular policy goal of Mayor Michael Bloomberg. The city expects the system to turn a profit, which will be split evenly between the city and the operator.

Thousands of people already have signed up as Citi Bike founding members, paying the $95 annual fee for unlimited rides of 45 minutes. And supporters say New York has no choice but to join the ranks of cities such as London, Barcelona and Paris, all of which have successful programs.

As of last month, there were a total of 534 bike-sharing programs worldwide, according to Russell Meddin, a Philadelphia-based bike-sharing advocate who tracks and maps the programs. (The world’s largest public bike-sharing system is in Hangzhou, China, where it’s estimated there are 69,500 bikes and close to 3,000 docking stations.)

New York’s system, which is designed for short trips, works like this: Riders 16 years old and up who don’t have a membership can use a credit or debit card to get a multi-digit code to unlock a bike from a station. A $101 hold will be put on the card but not charged. Riders can then purchase a 24-hour pass that costs about $10 — a seven-day pass costs $25 — and allows for an unlimited number of 30-minute trips. Riders can return the bikes to any station.

By renting bike time, a rider is agreeing to the terms of use of the program, consenting to, among other things, taking responsibility for damaging the bright blue, three-gear bikes. The program recommends helmets but does not require them.

General liability, Orcutt says, depends on the situation. If a rider isn’t following city rules, such as riding against traffic, a resulting injury might be his or her fault; if the front wheel is loose during a ride, that might be the bike share’s fault; and if a rider falls into an open pothole, that could well be the city’s fault.

It has been a long road for New York City’s bike share, which has had to overcome the perception that the city’s bustling streets are too dangerous and its residents too uncompromising. (Think Dustin Hoffman’s famous crosswalk retort — “I’m walkin’ here!” — from the movie “Midnight Cowboy.”)

But the city has added 300 miles of new bike lanes in the past five years, plus 200 more miles of greenways and routes in parks. Long stretches along the Westside Highway and the Brooklyn waterfront have been redone with bikes in mind. And officials spent nearly two years and had 400 community meetings to pick docking station locations.

Still, many residents are giving voice to not-in-my-backyard arguments against the program, taking aim specifically at the large gray docking stations that have sprouted in city neighborhoods in recent weeks, taking up parking spaces and crowding entranceways.

At a raucous community board meeting this past week in Greenwich Village, about 200 residents gathered to complain about the stations.

“I don’t care what they do in Paris: I live in New York City,” Deborah Stone said to thunderous applause.

The launch of the program has been delayed twice — most recently during Superstorm Sandy, when the storm damaged much of the equipment, including bikes, that was stored in a Brooklyn Navy Yard facility.

But other large-scale bike-sharing programs in the U.S. have experienced delays too, including Chicago’s, now set to launch in June, and San Francisco’s, set for August. Both programs are being launched by Portland-based Alta Bicycle Share, which is running Citi Bike through a wholly-owned subsidiary called NYC Bike Share LLC, based in Brooklyn.

Such delays are to be expected, says Susan Shaheen, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. She says cities such as New York and Chicago will ultimately benefit from the technical trial and error of bike-sharing systems in cities from Tulsa, Okla., to Chattanooga, Tenn.

Shaheen also says research shows bike shares decrease accidents, giving credence to the strength-in-numbers theory pushed by bike share advocates, who suggest drivers adjust their behavior and become more cautious when more bikes are on the road.

Her research has found that bike share operators with more than 1,000 bicycles had an average of 4.33 accidents reported per year — with no fatalities reported. In New York City, there were 369 severe injuries for bicyclists reported in 2011, with 22 fatalities, according to city data.

Washington, D.C.’s program, which began in 2010, now has 1,100 bikes but also had to overcome some opposition early on, mostly about the docking stations.

“Basically, they just kind of disappear into the landscape,” says D.C.’s Capital Bike Share project manager Chris Holben. “You know, there’s your bus shelter, there’s your trash can, there’s your bike station.”

Copyright (2013) Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Three bicycles in New York City's Citibike share program. Planetgordon.com / Flickr

New York City’s upcoming public bike share program, Citibike, has already irked parking space seekers, food cart vendors and locals who resent seeing a Citibank sponsor logo on nearly every block.

Now, heavier New Yorkers can be added to the list.

According to the program’s user contract, riders “must not exceed the maximum weight limit” of 260 pounds (120 kg) if they wish to sign up for the short-term bike rentals that will soon be available on city streets.

“These technical specs are established by the equipment manufacturer and are the same as other bike share cities around the world,” said Seth Solomonow, a spokesman for the New York City Department of Transportation, which oversees the program that is funded by Citibank.

The bike program, slated to launch later this Spring, will make several thousand bicycles available throughout the city for cyclists who sign up for yearly, weekly, or daily passes. The bikes can be picked up and dropped off at different docking stations during the course of a day and are meant to provide an alternative to traveling by subway, bus, or car.

The city has no way of enforcing the weight limit, and Solomonow said that he and his department “expect people will use the bikes safely.”

New York City residents Amanda Wotton, 26, and Anthony Laporta, 31, said the policy is not fair.

“The city should provide different types of bikes so everyone can participate,” said Laporta, a computer technician with a slender build who was enjoying a salad lunch in the park outside the New York Public Library. “Otherwise, someone’s definitely going to feel left out.”

Wotton, an average-size woman who works as a graphic designer, observed that 260 pounds “isn’t even that much — there are probably big muscular guys and NFL players that would be barred from cycling.”

Groups advocating for the rights of obese and overweight people also criticized Citibike’s terms of service. James Zervios, a spokesman for the Obesity Action Coalition, called the policy discriminatory.

“If the city’s offering bikes they should have bikes that accommodate all shapes and sizes,” Zervios said. “This is another example of a certain population being pulled out and put under a spotlight for no reason.”

Policies that single out heavy people have become more common in recent years, Zervios noted.

Last month, Samoa Air began determining plane ticket prices based on a passenger’s weight and the length of their trip, and several years ago, some ambulance crews raised their regular fees when transporting very heavy people.

The Citibike program has gained a number of detractors in the city. Irate drivers insist precious parking spaces should not be taken over by bike racks. Owners of a housing cooperative, or co-ops, in downtown Manhattan have claimed the stations are dangerous to people walking out of their building.

Preservationists in historic neighborhoods like Fort Greene in Brooklyn say the Citibank-branded installations are an eyesore. And food cart vendors have protested against a station they say displaced their business.

Reporting by Atossa Araxia Abrahamian; Editing by Barbara Goldberg and Marguerita Choy. Copyright (2013) Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions. 

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Over the weekend, the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) stopped two SideCar drivers in a sting operation. The agency used the app to order two rides, then detained the drivers. One woman was allowed to go home, while the other woman was issued a citation and her car impounded. In response, SideCar has called upon the public to phone the city and tweet about the issue, citing a survey that says 83 percent of New Yorkers are in favor of ridesharing.

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San Francisco City Hall. Kevin Wong / Flickr

San Francisco Mayor Edwin Lee has long been outspoken in his support for new laws that would foster a thriving environment for the emerging sharing economy. How does he describe the laws that restrict the growth and legality of travel startups in the the Valley?

“Outdated.”

It turns out that other state stakeholders are open to the idea as well.

Earlier this month the Mayor’s Office of Civic Innovation teamed up with Airbnb and GIS software creator Esri to host a hackathon that sought technical innovations that “re-imagine how tourists and residents experience and explore the City of San Francisco.”

When asked about the legal barriers that startups already targeting tourists in the Bay area contend with, Jay Nath, the Mayor’s Chief Innovation Officer said, “It goes back to a larger discussion that we’re having about the sharing economy. We’re applying 20th century rules to a 21st century model.”

“It’s a big organization and it takes time for the regulatory environment to change,” says Nath. “It’s about having the conversation with different regulators.”

Car sharing

In mid-February, airport car rental startup FlightCar received a cease and desist letter from SFO, hours after its official launch.

“…even when we launched we knew it wouldn’t last very long. It was little surprise that they issued a cease and desist, but it was surprising how quickly they reacted,” explains Kevin Petrovic, co-founder of FlightCar.

Flightcar wasn’t able to pay the fees that were required for it to continue operating at the airport so the startup decided to stop operations and contracted a third-party limousine company in order to access customers at the airport.

“I think the airport is understandably out to protect its own interests given how much it makes from taxis, car rentals, and long-term parking,” says Petrovic. “At the same time, we would have been very interested in working with someone where we would be happy with the outcome … they weren’t really willing to give any leeway.”

SFO spokesman Doug Yakel; however, says the airport is “open to new business ideas.” The challenge, according to Yakel, is figuring out where new business models like FlightCar, Lyft, and Sidecar fit into the current permitting process.

“From an airport perspective, we want to provide transport options that our customers want,” says Yakel, citing the expansion of the BART system to SFO as an example of the airport listening to flyers’ requests.

There are currently no ride-share startups that have a permit to operate at SFO, but the airport has met with several companies to discuss the different avenues that would help them get certified to operate at the airport.

The future of ride-sharing startups and e-ride concepts is currently hinged on a proceeding underway within the California Public Utilities Commission. The proceeding looks at the state’s regulations for providing transportation services and if or how they need to be changed.

Andrew Koch, Information Officer at CPUC, says “if all proceeds as anticipated, a final decision should occur sometime in August.”

Short-term rentals

Startup Airbnb and short-term rental veterans like Homeaway and VRBO deal with an entirely separate set of issues that, at times, pits homeowners, renters, tourists, and politicians against one another.

President of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors David Chiu is leading the discussion that’s aimed at formulating a policy to regulate the short-term rental economy in San Francisco.

“Most of the activity is currently illegal under San Francisco local law,” says Amy Chan, a legislative aide in the Office of Supervisor David Chiu. “Right now the law says you can not rent for less than 30 days if you’re in a building with four or more units.”

Legalizing the activity involves figuring out how to protect the city’s housing stock, how not to turn apartment complexes into hotels, a tracking system for such activity, and a time limit for how often residents are permitted to rent their home for fewer than 30 days; not to mention issues of security, liability and insurance.

“We don’t want to take housing units off the market [for renters], but want to create flexibility for residents,” says Chan.

Vague timeline

Chiu’s office has been working on these issues with a small number of stakeholders for over a year and is looking to release a draft of the legislation in the next couple of weeks. That vague timeline has been quoted before, and Chan says deliberations have taken much longer than expected.

The overall concept of the discussed legislation is to legally permit San Francisco residents, living in buildings with four or more units, to rent out their primary residences for fewer than 30 days at a time. Apartment owners would be able to override the legislation and restrict their tenants from renting or subleasing a space for that amount of time.

In order to pass the legislation, the board of supervisors, planning commission, and mayor would have to sign off on the new law.

Airbnb has been an active participant in the discussions with Supervisor Chiu.

Molly Turner, who manages public policy at Airbnb, hints a day when the startup and its peers can celebrate a political victory.

“We’ve been making a lot of process with the policymakers, but it takes a long time and it’s hard stuff. We’re very happy with how the conversation has gone.  The policymakers have been receptive and curious,” says Turner. “We’re reaching a point when something will be introduced soon…we’re hopeful.”

Working with locals to create regulations

Although it seems that everyone in the city is looking forward to a day when the sharing economy is indeed legitimized, some stakeholders may not be. Neighborhood associations and individuals could be opposed to sharing their buildings and sidewalks with transient visitors.

Homeaway co-founder and Chief Strategy Officer, Carl Shepherd, told Skift that he recommends making short-term rental regulations “very easy to understand, very easy to comply with, and make sure all of the delineations are clear.”

Shepherd also recommends local governments work with stakeholders including neighborhood associations, property managers, and residents to create the regulations. This is a step that San Francisco has not yet reached.

Skift reached out to a number of neighborhood associations in the San Francisco area and all responded that it was the first time they had heard of the proposed legislation. Each was interested in discussing the issue internally before issuing a statement, but JJ Stahle, President of the North of Panhandle Neighborhood Association, told Skift:

“We are happy that the City is taking up the issue of short-term rental units.  Much like that of the unregulated ride services, there is obviously a need for such services and it is incumbent upon the City to legislate rules and regulations in order to ensure the safety of residents and guests, eliminate the possibility for eviction of tenants in favor of short-term rentals and to collect appropriate taxes to administer such regulation.”

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An Uber driver in Seattle, WA. Mike Folden Productions / Uber

… Over the last year, new startups have sought to compete with Uber by offering transportation services without traditional commercial insurance or licensing. Uber refrained from participating in this technology sector — known as ridesharing — due to regulatory risk that ridesharing drivers may be subject to fines or criminal misdemeanors for participating in non-licensed transportation for compensation.

…  Uber will roll out ridesharing on its existing platform in any market where the regulators have given tacit approval;

In the absence of regulatory leadership, Uber will implement safeguards in terms of safety and insurance that will go above and beyond what local regulatory bodies have in place for commercial transportation.

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Such services don’t have to jump through the same set of hoops the state requires of a traditional cab companies, and their recent surge in popularity has drawn the ire of taxi and limo drivers. But they are operating within a gray area of current California law.

“We have an obligation to ensure safety and provide a fair playing field for all transportation providers,” said Airport Spokesman Doug Yakel. “This is a much bigger issue than just the airport.”

The cease-and-desist order issued to SideCar:

Download (PDF, 877KB)

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Chanting “no respect, no work,” the drivers told AllThingsD they are protesting the way Uber treats them.

“They’re running a sweatshop with an app. They don’t have the balls to come down and talk to us. We’ve been here for two hours,” said Raj Alazzeh, a driver with SF Best Limo who is serving as the group’s spokesman.

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New York City yellow taxi cabs pass by the Ripley's Believe It or Not! museum in Times Square, New York. / Reuters

A pilot program that would allow people in New York City to hail yellow cabs using a smartphone app was blocked by a judge on Thursday, handing a victory to private car companies that have said the program threatens their business.

Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Carol Huff granted a request from the livery companies to freeze the new “e-hail” program that had been scheduled to begin as early as Friday.

The order will be in effect until at least March 18, when the two sides are due to return to court to argue the merits of a lawsuit brought by the livery companies against the city.

The pilot program would allow people to use a phone application to request a yellow cab ride. Taxi drivers would be able to receive such requests and confirm pickup locations.

Private car companies rely on prearranged pickups. Under New York’s two-prong cab system, yellow cabs handle street hails but cannot accept phone pickups; livery cars do the opposite.

The program would be an option for New Yorkers accustomed to standing in the street and flagging down the city’s approximately 13,000 yellow cabs. E-hail apps like Uber and Hailo have become popular in other cities.

Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Cynthia Johnston. Copyright (2013) Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions. 

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