Following the Money that follows the Pols

The taxi industry is fraught with both litigation and regulation. So it's not surprising that industry players are lining up behind various candidates for mayor of the city of New York.

The Wall Street Journal has a nice story about various sectors of the industry are picking sides. Livery cab owners are backing Bill Thompson, who backs the outer borough taxi plan.  Yellow cabs are backing Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, who opposed the plan, or at least the way it was passed without the City Council.  Some yellow fleet owners backed Anthony Weiner early on. Considering what's happened since is kind of like catching a cab and realizing a block later that you forgot your lunch box and had to go back home.

In NYC, cabbies are still looking for a hand

In New York, the hand is still mightier than the app. This is according to a report in the Times that says few riders have taken to taxi hailing apps, now available as part of a TLC pilot program. And when they try to use them, they rarely work.    

Here is the key finding as reported in the paper of record:

According to data from the city’s pilot program for taxi-hailing smartphone apps, the revolution has yet to arrive.

Over four weeks in June, the first month of the program, trips arranged by smartphones accounted for less than one-quarter of 1 percent of all yellow taxi rides. Of the roughly 117,000 requests made using the apps, only 17 percent were “successful,” the city said — meaning a driver and rider eventually found each other using the program.

Of course, apps may be more useful in cities where there are fewer cabs and fewer passengers.

Despite the TLC's vaunted efforts to get cabs to the outer boroughs, 85% of the app attempts came from Manhattan, where the most of the passengers are and, therefore, most of the cabs are.

"the reality is we don't need these taxi hailing apps," says Eugene Weixel

Loyal "Taxis and the Law" blog reader has an excellent piece in the Guardian on the danger and folly of taxi hailing apps. Here is the link, with some highlights below.

Well done, Eugene!

"Let me put it this away: anyone can be both a data input clerk and a taxi driver. If I have a data input job during the week and I also drive a taxi on weekends, this wouldn't concern the public. Were I to combine the two occupations and do them simultaneously, it should be a matter of serious concern. If 14,000 drivers (or more at peak times) are being encouraged to do this with the approval of the municipal authorities, it is an even greater concern. Yet this is exactly what is happening in New York City, and the local media and mayoral candidates have little to say about it and likely are oblivious to it."
***
"At those times taxis and livery cars are really scarce (such as when it's raining or at shift change time) Hailo is still useless. Why would a taxi driver pass up people waiving and whistling and shouting to him in order to answer a Hailo call? The only reason to ignore potential customers and answer Hailo is if a driver is trying to impress the Hailo management. 

Hailo instituted a point system for drivers – complete with little badges of bronze, silver and golden colors and other "recognition". But let's be honest, drivers do this for money, not badges."

Maybe not today, Maybe not tomorrow either.

Opponents of Mayor Bloomberg's Taxi of Tomorrow project filed suit to block the initiative Wednesday, with just months before the first of the new Nissans are to supposed to hit the New York City streets.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the case was filed by the Greater New York Taxi Association, which is the smaller of two fleet owner group, and Evgeny “Gene” Freidman, who recently got into  a shouting match with Bloomberg, or so it has been reported at Madison Square Garden. The suit filed  in state court in Manhattan charges that the plan to force virtually all yellow taxi medallion owners to purchase a single vehicle oversteps the mayor’s authority under the law.

Freidman's real issue is that he is the largest owner of hybrid cabs and hybrid cab medallions. He likely wants to assure that his favored vehicles will remain taxi street legal, Even though the TLC has said it will allow exceptions for hybrids, Freidman's cabs could be overshadowed by the the "Tomorrow" cabs, that is if tomorrow ever comes.

Freidman appears to be relying on a a decision issued just yesterday that upheld the striking down of Bloomberg's ban on big-gulp sodas.