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ChineseDaily Transit Links Roundup for 5/30/08
Contributed by Fred Camino on May 30th, 2008 at 9:26 am
- The high price of gas has to be the fault of some greedy corporation or overzealous government, right?
- The United States is stuck in oil based stasis as the rest of the world moves on.
- Transit agencies face increased ridership and increased fuel costs.
- Planners transforming Sepulveda and Lincoln Boulevard in Westchester into pedestrian friendly thoroughfares.
- Starting in July, it may be a lot easier to catch a cab in Downtown and Hollywood.
- Questioning the solvency of the Gold Line in spite of increased ridership.
Discussion
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Please keep discussions civil: exercise Troll Controll.
That would be great if Hollywood and downtown allowed taxis to cruise for fares. I hope West Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Santa Monica and the Marina follow suit. Venice and Ventura Blvd. should be included as well.
The one potential danger in allowing taxis to cruise for fares is the “bandit cab” operators who would have a field day with it.
I agree with opening that door — it is rather ludicrous for the second largest city in the nation to still disallow this — but there will have to be an increase in regulatory oversight if people are going to be protected from unlicensed (and likely overpriced) operators.
Bandit cabs are already prevalent now, Kym. Basically, LADOT has to educate the public to look for the cabs with the circle DOT seal on the front door.
Surprisingly, the seal is one of the few things L.A. does right. Other cities and the county have taxi seals that are often on the windshields and are maybe two or three times larger than a postage stamp.
The LADOT seal is always on the doors and it’s about the size of a CPK pizza. Conspicuousness helps.
However, Gresham’s Law has crept its way into the operations of legal cab companies.
A licensed cab company can have drivers that are as dishonest as the bandits. Most of the bandits take advantage of unsuspecting riders by rigging their meters. One key difference is licensing. Bandits often don’t pay legitimate fees. Most of all, they don’t pay vigorish to the owner of a cab company.
Basically, a cabbie is a sharecropper. The driver must buy a vehicle — in L.A., the sedan standard is a $30,000+ Ford Crown Victoria with used police cruisers not much cheaper — buy the gas, make the repairs and pay insurance and license fees. So do bandit cabs. The key difference, though, is to be a licensed cab driver, the cabbies must go to one of the licensed cab companies and pay for the privilege of using the company’s name and livery.
The legit cab drivers have no incentive to be honest, because they figure if they get caught they can cross over.
I’d be interested in hearing what you think might be done about this, Wad.
Because if the dishonesty is as widespread as your post makes it sound, the change in the regulations will benefit no one.
Wad: That sounds an awful lot like the trucking business.
I don’t know if I can offer a solution that would work for L.A.
Think tanks, unsurprisingly, say deregulation. But, there’s a taxi consultant who surveyed many of the deregulated cities and found that service deteriorated to the point where many were re-regulated.
The answer is not necessarily a consent decree for cabs.
Schaller, the consultant, stresses that we should first know the nature of the taxi trips before making changes. We need to know the split between dispatched and spontaneous rides, as this affects how the services need to be regulated.