Crashes soar along with ‘Uber’ boom

As the number of people using for-hire car services like Uber has increased in New York, so, too, has the number of accidents.

Crashes involving the vehicles have more than tripled over the past two years — from 534 in July 2014 to 1,672 in June 2016, The Post has learned.

Records showed the frightening leap, which is the only major jump in numbers involving TLC-licensed automobiles during that same period.

There were five fatal crashes involving blackcar drivers between May and June of this year, just two less than in all of 2015.

By comparison, there have been no yellow taxis involved in accidents that resulted in a fatality so far in 2016. The number of yellow-cab drivers involved in crashes has actually gone down over the years — with 1,168 in July 2014, 1,118 in July 2015, and 1,054 in June 2016.

Since January, black cars have been involved in 9,062 crashes, which is 4,273 more than what was recorded during the same time period in 2015.

Drivers often work for multiple services, such as Uber, Lyft and Juno, and have more than one cellphone or tablet in their cars, taking their focus off the road. “The devices can be quite distracting,” said Nancy Soria, vice president of Green Taxis of New York.

The TLC notes the increase in crashes is in line with the increase in forhire cars on the road over that same period.

Some of the accidents are as minor as a parked black car’s mirror getting clipped by a passing vehicle, the agency said.

Still, taxi-industry officials are pouncing — say- ing the crash increase is because black cars have far less regulation.

“There is highly uneven enforcement on the street that skews heavily against yellow cabbies due to their high visibility, and away from black cars, which blend into the streetscape and are often impossible to differentiate from passenger cars at a distance,” said Michael Woloz, who reps the Metropolitan Taxicab Board of Trade.

And passengers agree — saying they are sick of distracted drivers who are constantly fiddling with their makeshift mobile command centers.

“I have experienced drivers focusing more on 10 screens than my safety,” fumed Lindsay O’Brien, a 25-year-old waitress from Midtown.