More like Grand Jam.
Getting home from the US Open is a chaotic mess because Uber has been price gouging rides up to $200 to Manhattan, canceling trips and leaving passengers with seemingly endless wait times, The Post has learned.
Despite a new ride share lot to make trips easier this year, fans have been plagued by a confusing, five-lane jumble of cars and frenzied crowds outside the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.
“It’s been the worst nightmare,” said Kathleen Kropp, a 55-year-old tennis teacher from Long Island. “The lines are horrible, and a lot of times you wait for an Uber and they’re never there.”
Fran Lavelle, 24, said Uber drivers ditched her so many times Wednesday night, she stopped counting.
“It says, a guy is two minutes away and then he cancels. They just keep canceling because they can get more money,” she fumed. “I am upset.”
“They’re charging me $200 to go to Manhattan — to Wall Street, ” she said of the 10-mile ride.
Jamie and Ian Goldbaum, who were headed home to Queens, said they got accepted and then canceled on by three Uber drivers within 15 minutes.
“I think the drivers are being picky. They probably want the longer rides,” said Ian Goldbaum, 47.
Others got so frustrated, they opted instead to wait 40 minutes in line for a cab.
This year, US Open organizers moved the ride share lot from behind the center’s iconic Unisphere to near the New York Hall of Science in an attempt to simplify transit — but the change may have thrown off drivers and riders.
“It’s been confusing everyone,” one US Open worker said. “It’s been the same way for years, and this year out of nowhere, they changed everything.”
“There have been a lot of complaints about the entire system,” she said, while strolling by a ride share lot snarled with traffic and crowds at 1 a.m. as people poured out of a night match in Arthur Ashe stadium.
Nearby, a tipsy tennis fan pointed a speaker blaring the Oasis tune “Wonderwall” toward a horde of irritated, would-be Uber passengers.
“I said, maybe you’re gonna be the one that saves me,” the lyrics blasted — in a seemingly desperate reference to securing a ride home.
At the new lot, ride-share drivers jam up 111th street as they wait to enter, causing longer wait times for the passengers.
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The result is that ride-share drivers appear to have trouble finding their customers in the jam-packed chaos, said one traffic agent.
“Once the cars come into the lot, they have between five and 10 minutes to pick up their passengers … and if they don’t leave, we just tell them to go,” said the agent, who asked not to be named. “Then they have to go back around and make that whole 45-minute loop again.”
Overall, US Open-goers interviewed by The Post said Uber was a problem — but didn’t complain about Lyft or other ride-share services.
Uber said high demand and fees in the Big Apple were to blame.
“Fares in New York are driven up by some of the highest costs in the country,” Uber rep Josh Gold said. “What people experienced during the U.S. Open is the collision of those government mandated costs with surging demand at a major event.”
Meanwhile, parking was also a giant headache for tennis fans who drove themselves.
“Someone told me, they were driving for an hour trying to get to the lot … they just ended up going back to the hotel,” the US Open worker said.
“A lot of people don’t know where the parking lots are. And they go around in circles.”
Laurie, 71, who drove to the tournament from Central Jersey, said signs directing drivers to parking lots were unclear and way too small.
“Half an hour we drove around, and we were a mile away. We circled around 20 times. It was a nightmare,” she said, adding she was looking for the handicapped parking lot.
USTA said the NYPD had asked that the lots be rearranged, and “it has worked far better than it had in previous years.”
“This was an optimal time to consider new alternatives, as ride share interest has increased each year, and this is the best option available to us.”
On the other side of the tennis center, it was smooth sailing for straphangers who took the 7 train or LIRR to Mets–Willets Point, a station with a boardwalk that leads directly to the tennis center and Citi Field.
“[It] was less of a hassle with traffic and expensive parking,” said Tasha, a therapist who took a train from Connecticut.
“We wanted to avoid any delays, to be honest, so we just took the train and the subways,” she said.
Laura Klemer, 31, said she had zero trouble coming and going from matches on the Subway.
“Why would you take the car?” she said. “Everyone drinks here, you know? Why would you get into that?”
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