# SCAM: Sticky surge appearing in IMPOSSIBLE areas - "Bait and ditch"



## Jenga (Dec 10, 2018)

Ok, I recently made a post stating that sometimes sticky surge values are unattainable due to their positioning on the heat map. This means the value - let's say $15 - is lurking above an area that it's impossible to drive to. And also impossible for a pax to ping from. 

The next day, after making my post (in a different thread) EVERY single surge value was in one of these "undriveable" areas. This means 2 things are most likely true:

1. This site is being monitored by Uber - perhaps its even OWNED by Uber - to gain info and spy on us. How else did they immediately make a change to MY area other than having access to my IP address? (Only the site owner and ISP would normally have access to that.)
2. The positioning of these sticky surges being literally impossible to drive to amounts to a "bait and ditch" scam. The bait is posting a surge value that is luring drivers in, and the "ditch" is disallowing the driver to ever get to the area by car. No "switch" is necessary (though Uber does that too as we all know.)

So the result is we see a $15 surge, yet the best we can actually attain by driving there is for example $5.50. This is a dirty trick and a scam. Of course, once we are on to it for a specific location, we can attempt to back engineer the "real" high sticky surge. However, I find this dishonest, demeaning, and unethical. It's bad enough that the "heat map" is basically bogus anyway, due to the fact that clearly delineated surge areas are not painted properly as they should clearly show each successive bump-up of surge based on driving further toward a target region. 

Specific examples of unattainable surge values posted today: 
A. In a protected parking lot for a private business.
B. Behind the TSA screening area and on the actual runway of an airport!
C. On a road that is closed access except for construction vehicles.

The final straw: Twice I parked my car and proceeded to walk on foot to the surge labeled area (2 different events at different locations). Each time when I positioned my hand carried phone directly over the spot - THE MAP REGION VANISHED! Only to reappear when I moved back to the nearest vehicle accessible area - and then LO and BEHOLD the surge was gone! 

Please post any similar events or experiences.


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

What you describe indicates incompetence, not malice. I've noticed the exact same thing in the past week.

My theory: Their systems are basically taking all the predicted ping points in an area and "averaging" them to a locus, somewhere in the middle (so that one vehicle could theoretically arrive at any given ping point in the same average time) for the highest surge amount. That locus isn't then verified for vehicle accessibility nor modified to the nearest vehicle accessible location.


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## Jenga (Dec 10, 2018)

Heisenburger said:


> What you describe indicates incompetence, not malice. I've noticed the exact same thing in the past week.
> 
> My theory: Their systems are basically taking all the predicted ping points in an area and "averaging" them to a locus, somewhere in the middle (so that one vehicle could theoretically arrive at any given ping point in the same average time) for the highest surge amount. That locus isn't then verified for vehicle accessibility nor modified to the nearest vehicle accessible location.


Well I would not argue the incompetence. However, it's physically impossible for several of these locations today to have been "averages" of ping points. Additionally, I received about 12 surges today and EVERY one of them was impossible to attain the maximum. What are the chances of that happening by accident or by "focus averaging". Average for the day (estimated) is that even though I drove as close as possible to every surge value, I received only 40% of the "baited" amounts, and achieved ZERO of the stated amounts. I've seen this occasionally before, and attributed it to "randomization", but there were always at least some full surges attainable in a day.

And to happen immediately after (stupidly) posting my formula for maximum surge makes me believe this site itself is a shill and 100% compromised... Maybe just the conspiracy theorist in me? I don't think so, and will starting now take appropriate measures to conceal my identity and IP.

But thanks for confirming there's something new afoot. The "bait and ditch" is the new "bait and switch".


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## Uber's Guber (Oct 22, 2017)

Jenga said:


> This site is being monitored by Uber - perhaps its even OWNED by Uber


This forum operates way too smoothly to be managed by the same dipshits who own Uber.


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## Jenga (Dec 10, 2018)

Uber's Guber said:


> This forum operates way too smoothly to be managed by the same dipshits who own Uber.


Correctly stated! But what does the owner of this smoothly running website get out of it? A few bucks for the premium memberships? Imagine if Uber comes to you and says: we'll pay you 200k/yr to supply us with all the personal info for each individual post we request - and also to monitor suspicious posts, drivers appearing to take advantage of exploits in the app, etc. Not a bad job... Would you bite on that?


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## Nats121 (Jul 19, 2017)

Heisenburger said:


> What you describe indicates incompetence, not malice.


Here's a wise observation courtesy of @New2This ... "First rule of dealing with Uber: Never attribute to incompetence what can also be attributed to malice".


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## MHR (Jul 23, 2017)

Jenga said:


> Correctly stated! But what does the owner of this smoothly running website get out of it? A few bucks for the premium memberships? Imagine if Uber comes to you and says: we'll pay you 200k/yr to supply us with all the personal info for each individual post we request - and also to monitor suspicious posts, drivers appearing to take advantage of exploits in the app, etc. Not a bad job... Would you bite on that?


We are owned by VerticalScope, Inc. out of Toronto, Canada.

They do not sell our information and are are actually quite protective of its members personal information.

If you legitimately have questions or concerns about this you can reach out to them via the Contact Us link (found in the footer of every page) and select the "privacy concerns" option.


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## FerengiBob (Nov 6, 2019)

With my wife out of town, I finally ventured out into the night to see what the 2AM bar scene looked like...

WTH is all this RED?

Oh that is a surge.

Head towards the heat!

Ping!

Wait What?

Pinged me before the heat, and had the nerve to send me just beyond the heat?

I drove by the lit up bars like a kid who had just learned there is no Santa Claus.

Nearly cried.

Just wrong!

When I got back to the heat, it had dropped from $15 to $1.50.

Hmmm... sneaky, very sneaky!


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## ObeyTheNumbers (7 mo ago)

Unattainable surges have been around for awhile now. Why drivers advise not to chase them, but to turn on their apps while under them.

The unattainable surge amounts are designed to lure drivers in those inaccessible areas to turn their apps on. And yes people landing in planes on runways about to leave the airport can take a ride. Why the full surge amount is located on the runway.

Uber is rideshare, it's leveraging the general public at large into giving other people rides.

It's set up to continuously attract new drivers or get existing ones with their apps turned off to turn them on and take runs.

Your paranoia is unwarranted, Uber can care less about you or the drivers doing this for a living.

Uber is not designed to be done as a living, the object for them is to get as many people ridesharing for others as possible.

If you do keep acting crazy, then perhaps they should be taking a closer look at you. 😄


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## ObeyTheNumbers (7 mo ago)

"Pinged me before the heat, and had the nerve to send me just beyond the heat?"

Next time go online when your right under the $$$. 

Going beyond is irrelevant. Go offline. Repeat above.


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## ubercrashdummy (Mar 5, 2015)

You just need a drone for that hard to reach surge.


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

Jenga said:


> even though I drove as close as possible to every surge value, I received only 40% of the "baited" amounts, and achieved ZERO of the stated amounts.


My average lock-in is around 80-90% of the maximum. I try to balance timeliness (before it disappears) with higher amounts. I'm usually content locking in an amount that's 75% of the maximum displayed. That last 10-25% isn't often worth the incremental effort.



ubercrashdummy said:


> You just need a drone for that hard to reach surge.


A drone with a phone!


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## Disgusted Driver (Jan 9, 2015)

ubercrashdummy said:


> You just need a drone for that hard to reach surge.


Love it!!!! 

Seriously though, OP, take off the foil hat. This has been going on for YEARS. I can recall once I was out at RDU airport and the surge was on the runway, was able to nab it by going through a tunnel under the runway. I've gotten out of my car and walked a half block into a park. Have had nice surges on the side of a highway (myself and other drivers were turning into a driveway so it was being displayed for all) a nice $20 a side street that I was able to hit 3 times in 45 minutes. It's a poorly programmed algorithm that you just need to take advantage of while you can, when you can.


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## Boca Ratman (Jun 6, 2018)

Sometimes the misplaced surge works to our favor. West palm airport when it surges, for some reason lately it sets off a surge a few blocks away where there's nothing but warehouses. The airport will be $12 or whatever but if I drive past the warehouses, I get a surge, it's usually a little more than airport AND, it doesn't show on the app nor does it only apply to airport rides. 

Never had a request from the warehouses, never even seen signs of life over there at night but I've collected 100s in sticky surge from there.


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## Jenga (Dec 10, 2018)

Jenga said:


> The final straw: Twice I parked my car and proceeded to walk on foot to the surge labeled area (2 different events at different locations). Each time when I positioned my hand carried phone directly over the spot - THE MAP REGION VANISHED! Only to reappear when I moved back to the nearest vehicle accessible area - and then LO and BEHOLD the surge was gone!


I'm quoting from my original post above. All of you I have quoted below PLEASE re-read and understand. When I said "unattainable" that means: IMPOSSIBLE even by walking, drone, or alien intervention (to address the several "tin foil hat" comments). When under the hot spot precisely, THAT specific map region VANISHES in real time and reappears only when coming back out from under it!

No, this can only be a deliberate human intervention specifically designed to post FAKE and truly unattainable sticky surges. I've dubbed it "BAIT AND DITCH" for a reason. The human area manager has specifically placed surges that are not only unreachable by car, but when reached on foot, they simply ditch us and go away! To my knowledge this is a NEW behavior. For a map region to disappear there has to be someone that programmed that to disappear. I have screen shots of standing as close as I can (without being blocked by the number) and the surge doesn't stick. When I walked directly under (can't see me anymore cause I'm under the number) the map region disappears.


ObeyTheNumbers said:


> Unattainable surges have been around for awhile now. Why drivers advise not to chase them, but to turn on their apps while under them.
> 
> Your paranoia is unwarranted, Uber can care less about you or the drivers doing this for a living.


It's not paranoia. Someone has changed EVERY usual sticky surge point to one that is unreachable and disappears when arriving on foot.


ObeyTheNumbers said:


> Next time go online when your right under the $$$.
> 
> Going beyond is irrelevant. Go offline. Repeat above.


Of course I've gone offline AND turned off GPS. You CAN"T get there anymore physically.
RE-read my post above. MAP DISAPPEARS when I walked under the precise location unreachable by car.


ubercrashdummy said:


> You just need a drone for that hard to reach surge.


Ditto


Disgusted Driver said:


> Seriously though, OP, take off the foil hat. This has been going on for YEARS. I can recall once I was out at RDU airport and the surge was on the runway, was able to nab it by going through a tunnel under the runway. I've gotten out of my car and walked a half block into a park. Have had nice surges on the side of a highway (myself and other drivers were turning into a driveway so it was being displayed for all) a nice $20 a side street that I was able to hit 3 times in 45 minutes. It's a poorly programmed algorithm that you just need to take advantage of while you can, when you can.


There have been incidences of runway fake stickies before. But RE-read my post above. MAP DISAPPEARS when I walked under the precise location unreachable by car.


Boca Ratman said:


> Sometimes the misplaced surge works to our favor. West palm airport when it surges, for some reason lately it sets off a surge a few blocks away where there's nothing but warehouses. The airport will be $12 or whatever but if I drive past the warehouses, I get a surge, it's usually a little more than airport AND, it doesn't show on the app nor does it only apply to airport rides.
> 
> Never had a request from the warehouses, never even seen signs of life over there at night but I've collected 100s in sticky surge from there.


If you keep this up, they will eventually change that to thwart you. I'm telling you guys, there is intention and specificity behind this NEW (to my area) trend where - let me repeat - EVERY SINGLE HOT SPOT is unattainable by driving to it.
Now, I did notice when I received actual pings from NEAR those hot spots there were some higher surge amounts given. So that will be their claim if we complain. Something like: "hot spots are designed to be representative of what you MAY receive from pings from that general area". Translation: goodbye sticky surge.

In the final analysis - for my area - I will summarize and embellish as follows:
1. The area manager has analyzed the sticky surge situation and has intentionally MOVED former familiar sticky surge hot spots to non-driveable areas.
2. These were done manually (not averaged by the algo) since ALL formerly familiar drive-to hot spots have been moved to NON-dreve-to locations very close to where you used to be able to drive to them.
3. Since the map region disappears when walking to the non-driveable location, this NEW programming behavior is BY DESIGN intended to disallow getting those advertised but unattainable stickies.

CONCLUSION: This is the end of the era of realistic sticky surges. The disappearing map phenomenon proves that this is by design and is new programming to prevent exploitation of hot spots by any means. My guess is that it may soon happen to all areas as soon as the area managers have a chance to manually look at their situations and move the usual hot spots. Beware!


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## wallae (Jun 11, 2018)

Heisenburger said:


> What you describe indicates incompetence, not malice. I've noticed the exact same thing in the past week.
> 
> My theory: Their systems are basically taking all the predicted ping points in an area and "averaging" them to a locus, somewhere in the middle (so that one vehicle could theoretically arrive at any given ping point in the same average time) for the highest surge amount. That locus isn't then verified for vehicle accessibility nor modified to the nearest vehicle accessible location.


I don’t agree
We have a solid red 12 surge at the airport at 3 am
Airport closed dark and locked for 3-4 hours 🤣
No demand anywhere in town
The airport is isolated away from town
Zero demand on the other side of the airport except from bovine


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## ANThonyBoreDaneCook (Oct 7, 2019)

At the Philly airport we have something that we like to call "The Deer Surge" where it only surges in the woods behind the airport.


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## ObeyTheNumbers (7 mo ago)

wallae said:


> .... airport except from bovine


We have been discovered! Attack!


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## Emptynesst (6 mo ago)

Jenga said:


> Ok, I recently made a post stating that sometimes sticky surge values are unattainable due to their positioning on the heat map. This means the value - let's say $15 - is lurking above an area that it's impossible to drive to. And also impossible for a pax to ping from.
> 
> The next day, after making my post (in a different thread) EVERY single surge value was in one of these "undriveable" areas. This means 2 things are most likely true:
> 
> ...


I can remember a time where they had a $20 surge, but there was a 6 foot tall fence guarding the parking lot that was not open and the $20 surge was in the middle of it, sitting on the outside of the fence it was only giving me a three dollar surge, so I decided to jump the fence walked 100 yards into the middle of the parking lot with my phone and got the $20 surge and went back to my car, I believe the next ride paid me like 40 bucks for 10 miles. Oh to be young again, I had to do it at least once, I have not done it sense


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## johnfraser1 (Dec 11, 2021)

FerengiBob said:


> With my wife out of town, I finally ventured out into the night to see what the 2AM bar scene looked like...
> 
> WTH is all this RED?
> 
> ...


I have found that once I have a surge going, I can accept requests outside the surge area and still get the surge $. I lost a couple surges from cancelling out-of-surge requests before I realized that.


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## ObeyTheNumbers (7 mo ago)

Emptynesst said:


> I can remember a time where they had a $20 surge, but there was a 6 foot tall fence guarding the parking lot that was not open and the $20 surge was in the middle of it, sitting on the outside of the fence it was only giving me a three dollar surge, so I decided to jump the fence walked 100 yards into the middle of the parking lot with my phone and got the $20 surge and went back to my car, I believe the next ride paid me like 40 bucks for 10 miles. Oh to be young again, I had to do it at least once, I have not done it sense


So now we know why they cause it to disappear when we get under it. 😄


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## Ted Fink (Mar 19, 2018)

wallae said:


> I don’t agree
> We have a solid red 12 surge at the airport at 3 am
> Airport closed dark and locked for 3-4 hours 🤣
> No demand anywhere in town
> ...


I know why this is happening


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## Ted Fink (Mar 19, 2018)

ObeyTheNumbers said:


> We have been discovered! Attack!
> 
> View attachment 670598


Don't attack brah, drunk deer just wants a ride home


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

Jenga said:


> Beware!


While I appreciate your tendency here towards "Paul Revere" style heroism, I'm content to settle for a percentage of the maximum displayed. If I'm confident that I can reach the center of the hotspot within 6 minutes *and* I'm content with 75% of the maximum, then I'll head there with app offline and go online when I'm at the 6 minute mark. In practice, this works out to my only chasing those amounts above $6.00.



Heisenburger said:


> My average lock-in is around 80-90% of the maximum. I try to balance timeliness (before it disappears) with higher amounts. I'm usually content locking in an amount that's 75% of the maximum displayed. That last 10-25% isn't often worth the incremental effort.


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## Disgusted Driver (Jan 9, 2015)

I've had the surge map go away as I'm getting to a location or appear to because I'm offline as I approach a high surge so the surge map doesn't update. Is that what you are referring to? Otherwise I've never seen this phenomena so I can't really comment. 

If I'm trying to grab a large sticky, I stay logged in with just Connect or Pet so that the map keeps updating otherwise if you are logged out you don't really know for sure what the surge is.


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

wallae said:


> We have a solid red 12 surge at the airport at 3 am
> Airport closed dark and locked for 3-4 hours 🤣
> No demand anywhere in town
> The airport is isolated away from town


So, what's the better explanation than incompetence?


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## wallae (Jun 11, 2018)

Heisenburger said:


> So, what's the better explanation than incompetence?


Random place 
On a random timer
Idk 
I wish a disgruntled Uber programmer would talk


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

wallae said:


> I wish a disgruntled Uber programmer would talk


Yeah for an enterprise that's been operational for over a decade and NDAs that expire within several years of leaving a company, it seems that we should have heard from one of these folks by now.









The Key Elements Of Non-Disclosure Agreements


If you are sharing confidential business information, learn when it makes sense to have an NDA in place as well as the important terms that agreement must include.




www.forbes.com


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## bobby747 (Dec 29, 2015)

SOME guys use thier phones with app on on a droid to hit the $20 spot


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## Trafficat (Dec 19, 2016)

ubercrashdummy said:


> You just need a drone for that hard to reach surge.


Which is why it often surges over the air force controlled part of the airport. Drones will be downed.


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## Jenga (Dec 10, 2018)

Disgusted Driver said:


> I've had the surge map go away as I'm getting to a location or appear to because I'm offline as I approach a high surge so the surge map doesn't update. Is that what you are referring to? Otherwise I've never seen this phenomena so I can't really comment.


No, that is bait and switch when lure you in and then change the value or take it away. That's been going on forever.


> If I'm trying to grab a large sticky, I stay logged in with just Connect or Pet so that the map keeps updating otherwise if you are logged out you don't really know for sure what the surge is.


What are Connect and Pet? Please explain....


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

Jenga said:


> What are Connect and Pet? Please explain....





https://www.uber.com/en-US/blog/uber-connect-ondemand-package-delivery/





https://help.uber.com/driving-and-delivering/article/pet-friendly-rides-?nodeId=0c8c3925-97df-4822-839b-fd78470e1a42


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## tonytone1908 (Aug 5, 2019)

I've seen them put the only good surge in my area inside of a locked cemetery. Normally I'd roll through anyway to get the surge but as I said it's locked. So $16 surge closest you can get I'd $5.50. BS.


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## tonytone1908 (Aug 5, 2019)

Emptynesst said:


> I can remember a time where they had a $20 surge, but there was a 6 foot tall fence guarding the parking lot that was not open and the $20 surge was in the middle of it, sitting on the outside of the fence it was only giving me a three dollar surge, so I decided to jump the fence walked 100 yards into the middle of the parking lot with my phone and got the $20 surge and went back to my car, I believe the next ride paid me like 40 bucks for 10 miles. Oh to be young again, I had to do it at least once, I have not done it sense


They were putting $40 surges on back roads that were actually easily accessible but it's just strange where they were because they were not surge areas at all. I used to be able to snag 2 or 3 of em someday on a 4 minute ride and went right back or waited a bit and jt popped back up again. Ah... the good old days.


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

Jenga said:


> No, that is bait and switch when lure you in and then change the value or take it away.





tonytone1908 said:


> I've seen them put the only good surge in my area inside of a locked cemetery. Normally I'd roll through anyway to get the surge but as I said it's locked. So $16 surge closest you can get I'd $5.50. BS.





tonytone1908 said:


> They were putting $40 surges on back roads that were actually easily accessible but it's just strange where they were because they were not surge areas at all. I used to be able to snag 2 or 3 of em someday on a 4 minute ride and went right back or waited a bit and jt popped back up again. Ah... the good old days.


Yeah, they're incompetently mapping the area. Their machines are actually calculating the *actual* geographical center center of a *pretty* large geographical area when they want to "load balance" the available vehicles at that surge time. The methodology fails to consider accessibility by vehicle or public roadway for *any* surge value in that area of heat. It's not intended to represent any given street or intersection of hotspot demand. It's not that sensitive or specific.


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## sstewart (6 mo ago)

Jenga said:


> Ok, I recently made a post stating that sometimes sticky surge values are unattainable due to their positioning on the heat map. This means the value - let's say $15 - is lurking above an area that it's impossible to drive to. And also impossible for a pax to ping from.
> 
> The next day, after making my post (in a different thread) EVERY single surge value was in one of these "undriveable" areas. This means 2 things are most likely true:
> 
> ...


You mean like the one I'm looking at that's over a lake? Surge baiting started about a year ago. They also use it in trying to get you to sign on and drive. I look forward to them suffering severe driver shortages again once the economy mellows out.


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## Yotadriver (May 1, 2020)

Jenga said:


> Ok, I recently made a post stating that sometimes sticky surge values are unattainable due to their positioning on the heat map. This means the value - let's say $15 - is lurking above an area that it's impossible to drive to. And also impossible for a pax to ping from.
> 
> The next day, after making my post (in a different thread) EVERY single surge value was in one of these "undriveable" areas. This means 2 things are most likely true:
> 
> ...


My favorite is the dead zone at the BNSS railyard that we can’t access or the area behind home depot off the 25 Santa Fe exit


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## Ted Fink (Mar 19, 2018)

tonytone1908 said:


> I've seen them put the only good surge in my area inside of a locked cemetery. Normally I'd roll through anyway to get the surge but as I said it's locked. So $16 surge closest you can get I'd $5.50. BS.


Get out ya car and jump the fence! Where is the commitment? The dedication? The bulldog tenacity?


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

wallae said:


> Random place
> On a random timer


That's certainly not going to benefit Uber's bottom line. That's a hard sell to executives in charge of profitability:

_"Hey boss, great new idea here: random surge amounts in random locations, even known historical dead spots!"

Great idea junior! By the way, pack your shit! You're fired! _


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## The Jax (Apr 17, 2018)

ANThonyBoreDaneCook said:


> At the Philly airport we have something that we like to call "The Deer Surge" where it only surges in the woods behind the airport.


You know, there may be some truth to that. I have delivered some real pain in the a$$ catering orders to the UPS facility way over on the other side of the airport on those access roads. There is a SEPTA bus that services those areas but the facilities over there are large (you probably know but this is for everyone else) and some people just want an Uber.


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

I've chased enough of these surges over the past year to have identified some specific trends. The center of any given surge area where the surge amount is the highest in that shaded area is specifically calculated by a machine to enable a car in that spot to get to any riders within a certain "time radius" (not distance) of that spot in under 16 minutes (if it's a pretty rural area), in under 12 minutes (if it's a mostly suburban area), and in under 8 minutes (if it's an urban area). I know this because the time to pick-up from the highest surge spot is *always* several minutes, and *never* under 5 minutes. Never.

Surges will appear in suburban and rural *residential* areas very late at night even when it's not a holiday or other partying occasion and nobody's headed to catch a plane because it's not an outbound flight time of day (even at the busiest airport in the land: Hartsfield Jackson International).

It just makes sense from a load distribution perspective. You need cars in the right *general* places at the right times to minimize wait times for predicted demand in that *general* area. Anytime the balance of supply and demand is outta whack, the method to rebalance it is surge. Surge by broad area, like a 5 mile radius (in suburban and rural areas) makes sense especially when so few cars are available at certain times in certain areas.


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