The Hotel Room

I have wondered from time to time if it's just because I'm getting older or if it's because the mores of our society have changed or if it's simply that I don't drive on Friday or Saturday nights anymore that have caused a particularly outrageous activity to vanish from the back seat of my taxi. No, not slopping up the upholstery with cheese nachos.

Sex.

It's been something like four or five years since it last went down. And then it annoyed me so much I threw them out of the cab in the middle of Times Square. Maybe that's what did it. But it finally happened again a couple of nights ago after such a long intermission - a throwback, it was, to the good old days.

Enter the stars of our show at exactly 1:52 a.m. at 2nd Avenue and 84th Street. She, an attractive brunette and he a not unattractive guy with a normal haircut and a bit of a beard, both twenty-somethings. There was nothing over the top about their appearance, nothing that would have made you think that defects in their character were showing up in the way they carried themselves or by the way they looked. In fact, they struck me as a couple of nice kids as they climbed in and told me their destination, 117th Street and 8th Avenue in Harlem. The girl, in particular, greeted me with a warm hello and a smile which gave me a sense of inclusion in their world, something that is appreciated by a cab driver in the middle of the night. It can be a lonely profession.

But that sense of inclusion quickly evaporated when I made a right on 83rd and headed crosstown. Their togetherness was too together for me to feel anything but excluded as she cuddled up on his chest and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. This would be another purely functional ride after all, the driver a mute extension of the taxicab itself, the passengers in their own space and bubble. So be it.

We stopped at a red light at Park Avenue. Having the chance to take my eyes off the road and glance around at the environment, I sensed that something was wrong here. Looking in the mirror, the girl had disappeared. Could she be taking a quick snooze on the guy's lap? Not unless she talks in her sleep, as her little female giggles were loud enough to carry over into the front of the cab. I feared the worst but carried on, turning right on Madison in the direction of the 97th Street transverse. Before we had progressed a block on the avenue the giggles had morphed into murmurs and there were some upper body movements of the guy which gave a further indication that what was going on in the back was an activity of the oral variety that is actually illegal in a public place.

No, not brushing your teeth.

Now, what is a cab driver supposed to do in this situation? Stick his head through the partition's window to catch the perpetrators red-handed (all right, perhaps "handed" is not the correct word here)? And if you do that, then what do you do? It's just too awkward to be confrontable. Besides, what if I poked my head through the partition and found that nothing untoward was actually going on, after all? Wouldn't that make me out to be the jackass?

So to hell with it. I would endure it all the way to Harlem if I had to. I made the left on 97th.

But then, as we began our trek across the Central Park transverse, they crossed the line. Looking in the mirror, they had assumed the "Taxicab Position" - the male sitting normally, facing forward, the female straddling him, facing the rear window. It means their activity had gone from "presumed innocent" to "you've got to be kidding" in the mind of the taxi driver. It was over the top, right in your face, and for the sake of one's dignity it begs for some kind of response.

I have two forms of retaliation to the appearance of the Taxicab Position and I immediately put the first one into motion. It is to attempt, by means of hard braking and sharp turning, to knock the female off her joystick. It's kind of like a party game like "Pin the Tail on the Donkey" - "Knock the Girl Off the Penis". So when I came to the next red light at Central Park West I slowed, then hit the brake with a noticeable thump. No good, she remained attached and continued to sway gently in place. When the light turned green I made the right on CPW as sharply as I could without putting the cab into a spin, but again it was to no avail. This girl could have a career in the rodeo.

By the time we came to the next red at 106th Street the party had ended, at least for the time being. She had dismounted somewhere around 101st and the two of them sat tight together, smiling and cooing at each other the rest of the way up to their destination at 117th. Still, it was not over as far as I was concerned. You simply cannot do this in the space of another human and not expect a settlement of accounts. This is my taxicab. This is my workplace. To fail to respond would be a humiliation in itself, an admission to myself that I was, in fact, just a mute extension of the taxicab. Something needed to be said, so the second form of retaliation was begun.

As I brought the cab to a stop at 117th and awaited payment of the $14.50 fare, I began a little end-of-ride conversation. "You know, the taxi rates just went up," I said in the general direction of the back seat. It was a true statement. There was a fare increase on September 4th.

"They did?" the girl responded.

"Yeah, there's a $10 surcharge now for the hotel room."

The guy laughed but his partner in crime did not get the joke. "I hope you're kidding," she said as she handed me a $20 bill.

I took the bill and held it in the air. "Yes... I am..." I replied, in a not unfriendly way.

"We're going to a hotel room!" she exclaimed, happy-faced, as if it were quite a coincidence that I happened to mention that.

"You've just been in one," I zapped back. Touche.

"Can I have three dollars back?" she asked, her smile still in place.

"Three dollars back," I repeated, with just the slightest hint of sarcasm. I slowly counted out the bills from my roll and offered them through the partition to whomever would take them. She moved forward to accept the money but as she did so her boyfriend interceded.

"Tell him to keep it," he told her, sotto voce style.

She paused a moment as the suggestion was processed. "Oh, you can keep the change!" she said with just the slightest hint of airhead.

"Gee, thanks," I replied in pretended surprise. I didn't need their three bucks. But this gesture in the fragile territory of Manners, Lack Of, at least did do something to compensate for their transgression.

They stepped out of the cab and closed the door. I looked over at them for a final mental snapshot and found that the girl was waving me goodbye, still smiling.

"Thanks for the hotel room!" she called back.

8P28 - An Intimate Biography

A not-well-known fact about New York City taxicabs is that they are allowed by city rules to be on the road for only three years before being retired. This is amazing if you think about it - that every wreck of a cab that you've ever been in was actually less than three years old, an age that would still be considered to be relatively young for a car if it had been living any kind of a normal life. But of course New York cabs lead anything but normal lives. In fact, it might be considered the ultimate test of a vehicle to be driven on the uneven New York streets - constant, 24/7 stop-and-go, doors constantly opening and closing, hard, hard braking - all by cabbies who usually do not own the vehicle and are in cut-throat competition with each other.

It's brutal. 

Whenever I mention this three-year limit to a passenger, which is often, I am invariably asked:

"What happens to the cabs once they're taken off the road?"

It's a logical question. Anyone who's ever been to New York City knows that the omnipresence of yellow taxis is as "New York" as a bagel with a schmear. Taxis are everywhere. The thought that they are all replaced every three years naturally makes one wonder where they all go. Well, there are three possibilities:

1) They are stripped down, usually to the bare chassis, for parts.

Taxi garages use the same vehicle for all their cabs (in recent years it's usually the Ford Crown Victoria). These cars are manufactured to be taxis and do not change significantly from one year to the next. Thus, the parts are interchangeable.

2) They are sold off to taxi companies in other cities or states or even in other countries. I know some of the New York cabs wind up in Mexico.

3) They are sold to individuals for use as private cars. In the taxi industry we have a special name for an individual who would buy a car that has already been used as a New York taxi for three years.

That person is known as a "sucker".

Which brings me to the story of 8P28, or "Sweet P", as she came to be known. Sweet P was a New York City taxicab for three years. She served the riding public with distinction and pride. When her time came to be relieved from service, she was eagerly purchased by a sucker for use as his own car.

That sucker was me.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's go back to the beginning to fully appreciate the story of this remarkable automobile.

BIRTH

Sweet P arrived in this world as a 1999 Ford Crown Vic. She came from humble beginnings, a factory near Detroit, and was destined from birth to be a workhorse of a car, specifically designed for use as either a police cruiser or a taxicab. This meant she had certain heavy-duty features that you wouldn't find in a regular Crown Vic, such as larger brake pads, a radiator that is especially for the transmission, and a fully vinyl, liquid-resistant interior, including the floorboards (just think, if you have the stomach for it, of all the kinds of liquids a NYC taxi must be able to resist). And her engine was a full, eight-cylinder dynamo with the muscle to overcome any sissy competition from the starting line at a red light.

She was purchased from a Ford dealer by the owner of a taxi garage in Manhattan in the year 2000 and was given the medallion number "8P28", a designation that is part of the identification system used for New York's 13,187 yellow cabs for legal and administrative purposes. At the garage she was outfitted with spiffy red decals which told one and all that she was available for service, and how much that service would cost. More than one passerby noted her exceptional beauty, and she was said to be the envy of many older cabs who might see her zip by on the street.

EARLY YEARS

Now, when you see the condition that many New York cabs are in, it may be hard to believe that they were once brand new cars. But they were. Just look at this shot of a cab (not Sweet P) about to begin its very first day of use...

Look at the shine and the complete lack of dents and scrapes. Observe the bright yellow coat and the sparkle on the hubcaps. Does it not take your breath away? And so it was with 8P28.

In her early years she was assigned to two steady drivers at the garage. In New York, there are two shifts to each cab - day and night, each for 12 hours. Some drivers lease the cabs by the week and have the same cab each shift. Others lease by the day and are assigned different cabs whenever they come in.  So naturally it's much better for a cab to be driven by weekly drivers as they take better care of the vehicles due to the fact that they always get that same vehicle. A sense of responsibility ensues, and this was a big break for Sweet P. Her oil was changed regularly, her engine was kept tuned, and her filters were cleaned. And, most importantly, she was driven at moderate speeds with care to avoid the minefields of potholes that proliferate the city streets.

MIDDLE AGE

But after two years on the road, with an odometer nearing the 175,000 mile mark, Sweet P was separated from her weekly drivers and given over to the rougher daily guys. Other cabs could soon be heard whispering behind her back that her moldings were coming loose and her undercarriage was rattling. Sweet P may or may not have heard these unkind remarks, but she never lost her sense of professional pride. She continued to keep her drivers cool in the summer and warm in the winter and she once got a passenger to LaGuardia Airport from Midtown Manhattan in fourteen minutes, a record that still stands.

 

THE END?

But when a cab enters her third and final year, the dwindling spiral seems to pick up speed. The mechanics know the end is approaching and they start to pilfer parts for newer cabs. A knob here, a switch there, a seat replaced for one in poorer condition, an oil change missed, and before you know it, a cab that only months before had appeared vibrant and full of life is suddenly old and making drivers who get behind her wheel think she should soon be headed for the junkyard. Passengers, too, begin to take note of bumpy rides and show their displeasure by reducing their tips. It's not a happy time for anyone, least of all the poor taxi who is facing dismantlement and humiliation.

NEW LIFE

But just as it was beginning to look as if there was no hope, the finger of Fate tapped 8P28 on the dashboard. She was scheduled for an inspection by the Taxi and Limousine Commission and, in order to pass this inspection, had a major makeover including the installation of new body bushings, which is the automobile equivalent of a hip replacement. Suddenly she had a new zip in her gait and was seen rounding corners with noticeable ease. The inspection pass would mean an additional four to eight months on the road. Life seemed fun again.

At the same time, some things were changing in my own life. Seven years had elapsed since taxi drivers had been granted a rate increase and I was becoming so desperate in the money department that I had decided to supplement my income by giving tours as a taxidriver. My idea was to get a hold of an old cab, fix it up if necessary, and use it as a vehicle for touring. People would get a "taxi tour" by one of the most veteran cabbies around, a guy who has "more stories than the Empire State Building."

For months I put the word out to mechanics and owners of garages that I was in the market for a cab that was coming off the road. But I know a few things about cars and what's left of them after a life on the streets of New York, so I wasn't looking for just any old cab. I wanted the best. Finally Moe, the top mechanic at my garage, told me he had found the perfect vehicle. It was 8P28, a cab he said had just been overhauled to pass an inspection but was being taken off the road nevertheless. I had her assigned to me for a shift and found her, indeed, to be in excellent shape. Within two weeks I had struck a deal with the owner of my taxi garage. For the sale price of $900, 8P28 was mine.

IMMEDIATE TROUBLE

It took a couple of weeks to get her registered, insured, and outfitted with a bright new coat of yellow, but finally the day arrived when she was ready to roll out of the taxi garage and into a new life with me. But before she could drive out of the place she'd called home for three years, Moe had discovered a problem: the engine was "missing". What was happening was that the timing of the engine was wrong and it wasn't firing on all of its cylinders, making for a very rough idle. This became a chronic issue with 8P28 and the short version of the story is that fixing the problem properly would require replacing the engine - something I wasn't about to do - but it could be kept running by frequently patching up a leaking engine part.

Another way of stating the short version of the story would be to say that I had been deceived by the owner of the taxi garage into buying a car that wasn't what it was made out to be. Nevertheless, I blamed myself because this is what you expect from the owner of a taxi garage. And that's why a person who would buy a used cab is known as a sucker. Still, I was determined to use this cab as my touring car and I proceeded to spend hundreds of dollars getting her through the requirements of the state inspection.

And tour we did, at least for awhile. 

Sweet P adjusted well to her new role and seemed content to be a part of a new activity, albeit a much less active one. But the touring idea had problems of its own. The insurance needed to run such a business legally was much more expensive than I had anticipated. Sweet P continued to show her age by breaking down from time to time as the elderly are apt to do. And then finally the taxi rates went up significantly in 2004 and my need to supplement my income diminished.

THE ALONE YEARS

The truth is my need for her had come to an end. Sadly, she was relegated to occasional use as a back-up car. She sat alone most days in front of my home, no doubt dreaming about the time when she was the toast of 10th Avenue. There were many weeks when the only time she would see me would be when I'd come out to start her engine, and that was only to keep her battery charged. After one long period of inactivity this last summer, I found to my horror that wasps' nests had appeared behind the little door that covers the gas cap and in the driver's side door jam.

Poor Sweet P was becoming decrepit with age. Here is a shot I took when she taking one of her long naps...

I finally reached a point where I realized I was going to have to learn to let go. Aside from the wasps, the repairs, and the inspection that was over a year overdue, I was paying an extra $50 per month in auto insurance premiums that could no longer be justified.

Sweet P was going to have to go. With a heavy heart, I put an ad in Craig's List.

A BLAZE OF GLORY

Amazingly, I received many calls and emails showing an interest in the old girl. But one caller, an adventurous fellow by the name of Buzz Brown, was particularly persistent and wasted no time in showing up at my house to close a deal. His reason for wanting this particular car was unique and turned out to be utterly appropriate for a vehicle that had once been a New York City taxicab, a car that could take a beating under the most stressful of conditions.

What did he want to do with a car that had once been a New York City taxicab?

Use her in a demolition derby.  

A demolition derby is a like the carnival ride of "bumper cars" except the cars are real and the object is to be the last car standing after all the competition has been crashed into heaps.

And there are aesthetics involved. Buzz told me he planned to turn Sweet P into a shark with gray paint, sharp teeth, and a fin on the roof. He told me he'd send me pictures of the big event, which he did. And here they are...

In this last shot, I am told, Sweet P was battered but not down. She continued on valiantly until her poor heart gave out and she expired on the racetrack in a blaze of glory.

I am so proud.

 

********

And proud also to invite you to click here for Pictures From A Taxi.

Politics and Taxicabs

The so-called "strike" has been over for more than a week now and I've got to say that any way I look at it I'm kind of disgusted at the way the whole thing went down. I will attempt to analyze it and give you some perspective that I'm pretty sure you haven't heard anywhere else.

But first I want to thank Melissa Plaut for including an excerpt from my post, "Taxi Strike", in her own New York Hack blog last week in a post she called "Strike!". Melissa, of course, is the Queen of the Taxi Bloggers and by doing this she introduced my blog to a much wider audience, for which I am grateful. If you haven't heard, she has just had a book published which is a must-read for anyone interested in taxi drivers, New York City, or human beings. You can order it online by going to her blog and clicking where you're supposed to click. It's easy.

I attended a reading and book signing Melissa did at a Barnes & Noble in the Village on Tuesday night which was standing-room only (I stood). The whole thing was a great affair but what I liked best was observing the pride that showed on the faces of her mother and father and family members. If you're a parent, it just doesn't get any better than this.
And now, about the strike...

What It Was

It was a two-day work stoppage, which in reality is a type of protest. It shouldn't have been called a strike at all. A real strike is open-ended - it doesn't end until there's a settlement between labor and management. This was never the intention the Taxi Workers Alliance, which called for the action, nor was it within their capabilities.

How Many Cabs Were Out?

It was interesting to hear various groups and individuals give their opinions on this. The TWA was saying 90% were out. The mayor was saying the effect of the strike was minimal. The media commentators I heard were saying that the lines for taxis at train stations and airports were longer than usual, but not too bad. The truth is there is no way of knowing for sure because taxicabs are spread out all over the city, all the time. They are never in any kind of central location, so how can you count them?

Nevertheless, I have my own estimate. The only reliable information I received came from the night dispatcher at my garage who told me on the second day that only 30% of his cabs were not working. I think it would be safe to say that the owner/drivers, who will have to pay the high costs of the GPS systems themselves, were observing the work stoppage in larger numbers. So my estimate is that 50% of the drivers, at best, did not work on those two days.

So I was wrong in my post when I predicted that it would be like 1998 when a one-day stoppage was indeed observed by 90% of the cabbies and a significant impact was made on the city. I think it's sad that so many cab drivers chose to work on those two days. No, it's worse than sad. It's disgusting.

I'm sorry. I don't buy the excuse I kept hearing from drivers who were interviewed on TV that "I have a family to feed," or "I can't afford to miss any work." Bullshit. The drivers who rent cabs by the week don't work all seven days. They all take at least one day off. So taking off two days on this one particular week was too much to ask? And for the drivers who rent cabs by the day all it meant was switching their work days around on this one particular week. That is so impossible?

No. The only reason cabbies who chose to work did so was because they knew they'd have great business on those two days due to reduced competition and a lucrative pricing system that was implemented by the city. Plus they don't think of taxi driving as really being their career so there's no reason for them to make a commitment to it.

I worked the night shift on the night before the work stoppage was scheduled to begin. As I brought my cab back to the garage, I encountered a veteran cabbie whom I have known for several years and for whom I used to have respect. He was waiting to be assigned to a cab for the upcoming day shift. In other words, he was about to become a scab.

I confronted him in a firm, but nonthreatening, way. I was truly shocked that he was working and I told him so. His reply was, "There's no union!"

Now this is a guy who about eight months ago started losing his teeth. He is now almost toothless. He epitomizes for me the individuated mindset of many New York cab drivers. It doesn't occur to him that the reason he hasn't been able to replace his teeth is that he is underpaid and has no dental plan because there is no union and that a demonstration of some unity would be at least something that could be done to improve his very obvious problem. It was pathetic.

What Was Accomplished?

From what I can see the only thing that might be considered a victory for the taxi drivers is that their complaints are far better known to the general public and to the city government than they were before. The work stoppage received a lot of publicity locally.

Unfortunately the whole thing clearly showed how weak the drivers are as a group. I mean, if you can't get drivers to agree to stay home from work for two lousy days, you certainly can't get them to do more than that. So if anyone in City Hall had any serious concerns that taxi drivers had to be dealt with - or else! - well, they don't have those concerns anymore.

I contend that when the system we operate under was created in 1937 it was intentionally designed to be unorganizable. If all the city's taxicabs could be located at two, or five, or even twenty different garages, it could be done. But when you have 11,787 medallion taxis - the number in 1937 - consisting of about 5,000 individual owner/operators and the rest divided up among something like 50 different garages, I'm afraid it cannot.

So there is no clout. Taxi drivers will have to continue to depend on whatever sense of fair play the mayor and his appointees have at any particular time. Which, even if the current administration is fair and competent, doesn't mean that the next one will be, too.

What the Mayor Did

Mayor Bloomberg and his team were well-prepared for this action. A contingency plan had already been thought up and was put into motion the moment the work stoppage began. It consisted of a zone pricing system that was more lucrative for the driver than our usual metered rates, a group riding arrangement at the airports that was also more lucrative, extra buses, and the threat of allowing the outer-borough livery cars to accept street hails and do the airport business if there weren't sufficient medallion cabs on the streets.

The mayor took to the airwaves to encourage drivers to come to work and declared to the media that the work stoppage was having no effect at all on getting around in the city. He even had his picture taken sitting behind the wheel of a taxi. He would not meet with the leaders of the TWA to discuss their grievances and offered no willingness to negotiate at all.
Only one commentator that I was aware of, Ron Kuby on WABC radio (although I'm sure there were others), mentioned that the mayor was acting as a union buster and was encouraging workers to scab, something that is not considered fair play in management/labor relations. But again, it shows the weakness of the drivers. Can you imagine what a clamour would have been created if the mayor had refused to negotiate with the Transit Workers Union a year and a half ago when there was a brief subway and bus strike? That is what is meant by "clout". If you haven't got it, this is what you get.

What the Mayor Said

Because I am knowledgeable about the history of these things, I actually found it amusing to hear how the issues of requiring taxis to install expensive GPS tracking systems and passenger information monitors were being sold to the media and the public by the mayor. He said that all he was trying to do was make the taxi-riding experience better for the public. Okay, fine. He further stated that these "technology enhancements" had already been agreed to when we accepted the fare increases of May '04 and November '06, the implication being that by going on strike we were somehow backing out of a deal we had already made.

This logic was swallowed by the NY Times in an editorial in which they said that yes, the drivers may have some valid objections, but they did agree to it when they got the last fare increase, so they should honor that agreement now.

What??

The impression that the mayor seemed to be trying to give was that there is some kind of union and that the drivers all got together and voted to accept the deal. As we have already seen, nothing could be further from the truth. Obviously, there is nothing that can be called a union.

No driver ever voted or was even asked for an opinion about these "technology improvements". The only faction of the taxi industry that was consulted were the owners of the fleets. And they are getting a piece of the action (advertising revenues from the passenger information devices). And they were not in agreement with the work stoppage. In fact, they did everything they could think of to prevent drivers from participating in it.

What the Mayor Did Not Say

In order to illustrate the kind of duplicity that taxi drivers are subjected to, I am going to have to back up a few years and explain a bit of the history of the politics of fare increases. The first thing to understand is that fare increases do not just occur when the mayor or the taxi commissioner say so. They have to go through a lengthy bureaucratic procedure including public hearings and economic studies.

However, in all the years I've been watching this process, since 1977, these hearings and studies have always been merely a formality. Once an announcement is made by the Taxi and Limousine Commission that a fare increase is being considered, it is just a matter of time - within two months or so - that the increase becomes a reality.

By December of 2001 the taxi industry had gone six years since the last fare increase. We were hurting badly. The rate of fare in NYC has always been lower than almost all other major U.S. cities to begin with (in those days the rate was $1.50 per mile and 20 cents for a minute of waiting time), plus we were in the middle of the economic calamity of 9/11. The rate of inflation was about 3 to 4 per cent per year, so the value of our earnings was in the area of 20 per cent less than it had been six years prior. I myself was working four twelve-hour shifts per week (the most my body can endure) and barely had enough to pay for my extremely modest living expenses. Out of desperation I was considering leaving my chosen ( perhaps foolishly chosen) profession.

Then finally - three to four years late in my own opinion - a proposed 26 per cent fare increase was announced by the taxi commissioner, Matthew Daus, in mid-December. My spirits immediately lifted. Thankfully there would soon be relief to what had become a bleak economic scenario.

And then, in the last week of the month and in the last week of his tenure as mayor, Rudy Guiliani, who had been to the taxi drivers what Mussolini had been to Italy, responded to a reporter's question about what he thought about the taxi drivers getting a fare increase. He said he thought they should only get maybe a 10 per cent increase and that should only go to the owners of the "new" cabs.

The "new" cabs in those days were the Crown Vics that were being manufactured by Ford to have extra leg room in the back. They were just becoming available and were beginning to hit the streets with great popularity with both drivers and passengers alike.

Now let me fill you in so you will comprehend the monumental absurdity and mean-spiritedness of Guiliani's comment. If you didn't know any better this might sound like a harsh but not totally unreasonable statement for the former mayor to have made. But here's what the general public would not know. The types of vehicles that appear on the streets are mandated by the Taxi and Limousine Commission. They make the rules. We follow them. So the cab owner who purchased one of the "old" Crown Vics did so only because the TLC said that was the vehicle you must have. And, by a new rule that was adopted during Guiliani's administration, they are only permitted to be on the streets for three years, after which time they are automatically retired.

So if the former mayor's comment was to be taken seriously, owners, who had been following the city's own rules when they had purchased a new cab, say, a year ago (and now had almost zero resale value) would have to suddenly take this vehicle off the road and take out a new loan on a new car in order to get a ten per cent rate increase. And then there would be a two-tiered pricing system in effect creating a situation in which the public would never know what rate they would be paying when they hailed a cab (the Crown Vics look identical from the outside).

But Guiliani's comment was not taken seriously. It was a mean-spirited and disingenuous remark made by a lame duck official as a parting shot to the members of an industry he genuinely disliked. Why that was so could be the subject of another post. But I include it here as an example of how politics can effect an industry that has no clout. And as a lead-in to what happened next.

As annoyed as I was when I heard this comment, I knew that in another week Guiliani, thank God, would no longer be mayor and Bloomberg, who as far as I knew had no personal animosity toward taxi drivers, would take over. So I wasn't too concerned. The 26 per cent rate increase had already been proposed by the TLC and it was just a matter of a short time before it would clear the usual bureaucratic hurdles.

Bloomberg became mayor on January 1st, 2002. A month went by and nothing was heard about the rate increase. Another month went by. Nothing. And then another. I became puzzled and worried. It was taking way more time than it ever had in previous years for this proposed rate increase to be approved.

And then one day while driving my own car toward my taxi garage to start a night shift, I heard on the radio the voice of the taxi commissioner, Mr. Daus. He said that new industry data indicates that there are enough drivers at this time so a rate increase is no longer being considered.

Whaaat??!!

You did not want to be anywhere around me at this particular moment. I wound up screaming so loudly at my radio that I had a sore throat for two days.

It made no sense. He might as well have gone on the air and said that from now on taxi drivers will be required to wear their underwear on the outside of their pants. (Old Woody Allen joke from the movie Bananas.) There are enough taxi drivers at this time? Since when did that become the criterion for a rate increase? The reason for the rates to go up is supposed to be that rising costs of living and doing business warrant it. If we are to assume that a sufficient or insufficient number of people currently driving cabs is the criterion, we must also assume that the thinking is that no rate increase will be given until everyone is so poor that they are absolutely forced to quit! And how mean-spirited would that be?

I didn't believe for a minute that this was the real reason for this announcement. Beside the fact that it made no sense, if it was true the commissioner would never have said it. I knew there was some other reason, but I couldn't imagine what it could be. I started considering various conspiracy theories that might explain it. But nothing quite made sense. And months and months and months went by without that desperately needed fare increase becoming a reality.

Then, finally, in February of 2004 - two years later - the TLC announced that the same 26 per cent fare increase was again being considered. The bureaucratic process was put into motion and in early May '04 we did get that increase. (And no mention was made of there now being enough or not enough drivers.)

About a week later I had a realization that was like the proverbial bolt of lightning streaking through the darkness. I suddenly understood why the fare increase had been delayed for two years after it had appeared to be a done deal in 2001. Here's what actually happened...

A few months after Mr. Bloomberg became mayor, the TLC announced that plans were being made to add 900 additional medallions over the course of three years to the streets of New York. (A medallion is a license to own one taxicab. One medallion equals one cab.) This is an occurrence that is a rarity in NYC. It would be only the second time since 1937 that medallions had been added to the fleet, bringing the number from 12,187 to 13,087.

But, like fare increases, this cannot be accomplished by mayoral decree. Thorough environmental impact studies must be done and the whole thing must be passed on by various agencies and committees. It's a long process that would take about a year and a half. But when it does happen, it's a goldmine for the city because these medallions are auctioned off to the highest bidders. And the going price of a medallion at that time was around $250,000.

Mayor Bloomberg is a self-made billionaire who knows how to make money. He realized two things when he heard about the proposed fare increase just after he became mayor. One, that if adding more taxis to the streets could be justified, it would mean a ton of revenue for the city. And two, if the fare increase could be postponed until the new medallions were about to be auctioned, it would mean that much more money for the city because the value of the medallion would go up.

And he was right. The medallions went on auction simultaneously with the rate increase in May '04 and the value of the medallion shot up to around $350,000. And the city made a ton of money. But it was at the expense of the taxi drivers who deserved and were about to get a rate increase in 2002 but did not get one until two years later. That cost the taxi driver of NYC thousands of dollars that he needed badly just to pay for the basic expenses of living.

And that was the real reason for the delay in the rate increase. And that is what the mayor did not say.

Now you may be wondering how I can be so sure about this. Well, I'll tell you. First of all, it's completely logical. But secondly, a couple of months ago I had a passenger in my cab who, through the course of conversation, told me he works as a member of the mayor's staff. He was quite a nice guy and we had a free-flowing discussion, touching on things like how the mayor's office was organized into various functions, the congestion tax (click here for my previous post), and my thoughts about Guiliani. Just to see what he'd say, I mentioned that even though Mayor Bloomberg had intervened to delay the rate increase we were supposed to get in 2002 in order to coincide with the sale of the new medallions in 2004 - and this was something that had cost me thousands of dollars - I still liked him a lot better than Guiliani. Because with Bloomberg it was a business move, and I respect that even if it was at my expense. With Guiliani, it was personal.

And then he confirmed that what I'd just said was true - Mayor Bloomberg had indeed intervened to delay the rate increase.

So ladies and gentlemen, we have a little investigative journalism here with one completely credible witness. That may or may not be good enough for the NY Times, I don't know, but it is good enough for my blog! And as far as I know, this has never been revealed in any other media. So you can say you heard it here first.

Solution

I will say one thing favorable about Mayor Bloomberg. During his term a rule has been created that puts a cap on the leasing fee that can be charged by the garages to the drivers. And most of the money from the '04 rate increase and all of the money from the small '06 rate increase (click here to learn about that) went to the drivers. I think he felt guilty about what he'd done in '02 and wanted to make it up to us. And this shows that he's not an unfair person.

Nevertheless, the fact is that the taxi industry has no clout with City Hall and is therefore subject to the whims, chicaneries, and personal prejudices of whoever happens to be the mayor or those to whom he has delegated authority. And that is an unfair playing field.

The issue that underlies the protest about the mandated installation of the GPS tracking system is money. The city tells us what we can charge for our services, it is not enough, and then we must beg them for rate increases which are usually not forthcoming. If taxi drivers were making a good living, and the cost of the installation of the new system was being passed on to the consumer, it would not be such a big deal. So for real change to occur, the arbitraries need to be removed from the process.

I have an idea.

I think real change that could improve the substandard working conditions of the NYC taxi driver could come not from the executive branch of the city government (the mayor) but from the legislative branch (the City Council). I think a law needs to be created.

In New York City there is a system in place that is used to protect the tenants of rent-stabilized apartments from price gouging. A group called the Rent Guidelines Board studies the economics that affect landlords each year and sets a maximum percentage that rents can be raised. This is the law.

I think a similar law needs to be created regarding taxi fares. The function of examining the costs of being in the taxi business should be an ongoing affair that results in a mandatory adjustment of the rates at a specific time. Like once every two years.

This would take the politics out of the procedure.

And it would be fair and would do a great deal to stabilize the taxi industry.

And I'll tell you something else. It would be acceptable to the riding public. Everyone knows we live in an inflating economy. We accept the idea that as time goes on the prices go up a bit. But what drives passengers crazy is the huge rate increase. A moderate, predictible increase every two years would be tolerable and understandable. And fair.

I think the Taxi Workers Alliance should move its efforts away from the mayor and the TLC and focus on what allies may be found in the City Council. And make this idea the law.

And In Conclusion...

All right, I've said all I want to say about politics and taxis. Hopefully I have shed some light on what actually goes on. And who knows, maybe this idea will take root and do some good.

But in any case this blog will now return to what I have intended it to be - stories about karma vs. coincidence, traffic jams, and drunks who puke in the back seat.

Along with an occasional dog.