Most of us who use Uber or another ride-share have probably been in this situation. You're in a carpool with a ton of people, and the next person up lives down a complicated string of one-way turns. You look at the route and see you're actually closer, right now, to their drop-off point than you will be for the next few minutes of bumper-to-bumper navigation. Nonetheless, you have to sit as the car winds around to the address, wasting everyone's time. Well, now Uber will recommend nearby drop-off locations for precisely these situations. Currently the feature is only live in a few places, but I can't wait.

This doesn't just save time for the driver, or the other people in the car. This saves me time. Sometimes navigating one-way traffic-light-controlled streets in parts of town can take quite a while. Kicking me out at the corner is a shortcut, not an inconvenience.

I bum about the city on Uber very regularly and usually make a similar manual effort during the drive. If I know that it's faster for me to be dropped off on a corner, I'll let the driver know to kick me out there. Having it as a feature will be pretty convenient, although it does require that the passenger opt in via a prompt. The only unfortunate thing right now is that the feature is only available in DC, San Francisco, and LA.

Source: Uber