Uber Alternatives to Help Your Wallet

Long Beach is a dense, bustling city where giant corporations like Uber and Lyft dominate the rideshare landscape. Most people may not know that there are cheap and free alternatives to using these services to get around town.

 A popular app where users can grab free and environment-friendly rides is Circuit. The app services areas such as Palm Desert, Santa Monica, Huntington Beach, and Culver City.

Circuit also services the Downtown and Belmont Shore regions of Long Beach. Some of the notable areas that Circuit can let customers get dropped off are the Long Beach Convention Center and 2nd Street in Belmont Shore.

The app has specific service hours from Thursdays to Sundays, which can be found within the application.

The rideshare program boasts on its website that it only uses “all-electric shared vehicles (to) reduce emissions and traffic congestion.”

The electric shuttle service gives people the option of taking a chance with a gas guzzler from Uber or Lyft to get a guaranteed electric experience instead.

Another rideshare alternative is going the classic way by riding a bike. The Long Beach Bike Share program allows locals to ride and leave no pollution behind them.

The program entices users to partake in the service by having accessible prices. The program offers monthly and yearly memberships as low as $5.

The bike share program has been prominent in Long Beach with its 650 bicycles and 112 stations located throughout the city.

Long Beach’s bike share initiative includes the Bike Share For All program, which offers affordable membership costs for people enrolled in federal or state assistance programs like Calfresh and Medi-Cal.

Other ways of grabbing a ride in Long Beach can come from taking the Metro, riding an electric scooter, or using a personal vehicle.

The Long Beach Transit system is another way around the city. It has 250 buses available that follow the pre-designated 38 routes.  The transit system ranges from $1.25 for a single ride to $65 for a 30-day pass.

To help lower these costs, there are programs available. Students enrolled in LBUSD and LBCC schools can get a free GoPass TAP Card while students from non-participating schools can get reduced fare student passes.

The LIFE program offers additional savings for customers, depending on their household size and income.

The next time that people call an Uber, they can use these cleaner and cheaper alternatives that are easily available.