New York, NY – Mayor Michael Bloomberg released undercover video Wednesday of city taxi drivers refusing passengers because of their destinations and joined city officials to call for increased penalties against drivers who try to avoid unwanted trips.
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“I don’t know … Brooklyn Bridge … If they show me I would take them, but otherwise,” one taxi driver said to an undercover Taxi and Limousine Commission investigator before driving off.
Both drivers insisted that they didn’t know their way to the outer-borough addresses given by the investigators, who approached them at the driver’s window, giving them the address before attempting to get in the car. Both drivers said they didn’t have a map.
The TLC has proposed raising penalties against drivers who refuse to take fares, up to $500 for a first offense and a $750 fine for a second offense within two years. The agency wants to make a 30-day suspension mandatory for a second offense within 24 months.
Currently, the fines are up to $350 for a first offense and up to $500 for a second offense. Any driver with a third offense within 36 months gets their license revoked.
“We have been stepping up our enforcement efforts to ensure every person who puts a hand in the air to hail a cab is treated the same, charged the same way and taken to where they want to go without argument,” Bloomberg said in a statement.
Bhairavi Desai, executive director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, says that drivers are refusing fares that take them outside of Manhattan because the trips often involve long traffic waits and drivers often have a hard time finding passengers to fill the back seat during the trip back to Manhattan.
“This is an economic problem that needs an economic solution and instead the mayor is scapegoating drivers,” she said, adding that most drivers are struggling to make the roughly $150 per 12-hour shift they need to break even. Desai called for higher fares, lower taxi lease costs and taxi-only lanes.
The TLC says the number of service-refusal complaints are up more than 36 percent — from 2,128 between July 2009 and February 2010 to 2,887 during the same period a year later.
Long overdue
most drivers are struggling to make the roughly $150 per 12-hour shift they need to break even
But remember, with the new computers mandated by NYC these lies no longer work. NYC documented a massive increase in Cabbie income when the recession hit. Either people had more money to use on Cabs or we found out the true income rather than the lies the taxi drivers made up.
Its just an other way of making money for the city.
HARRAS
HARRAS
HARRAS
Back in the 1960’s, and 1970’s, a good proportion of the taxicab drivers were Yidden. Today, the drivers are mostly from third world countries, and can’t speak English that well. However, they know how to gouge the customers. In London, U.K., prospective taxi drivers must pass a very rigid examination, and learn where every single street in London is located.
As a frequent out of state traveler Taxi driver in other areas know much more about the areas they drive in.
i first started taking driver cars in 1973, long before the masses. Evan in those times when a driver car cost more than the average person could afford, I took driver cars to borough park. I could afford it. but the drivers seldom would take me unless i was on wall street (which i was). So, i got me a ride home; others could not.