DDS Wireless International Inc.’s Taxi business unit, Digital Dispatch, has entered into an agreement under which Taxi Video Guide Inc. (TVG) will provide paid video media content for DDS’s SmartCabTM mobile media service that is used in 1,200 New York City cabs.
The agreement provides for a potential $1 million in minimum fees to DDS over a 2 year period and further potential fees based on advertising billings achieved by TVG. TVG, a small entrepreneurial company must be approved as a sub-contractor by New York City and the Taxi and Limousine Commission (”TLC”). DDS expects most revenues to be earned in the later stages of the contract as TVG builds up its sales operations in New York.
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New York City Taxi - NYC TAXI
A federal judge dealt another setback on Monday to the Bloomberg administration’s two-year effort to convert the city’s yellow taxi fleet to gas-and-electric hybrids from the ubiquitous Ford Crown Victoria.
Judge Paul A. Crotty of Federal District Court in Manhattan said a plan to financially penalize taxi owners who refused to buy hybrid cars amounted to an effort by the city to mandate emissions standards — a right that, under existing laws, belongs solely to the federal government.
The same judge made much the same argument last October when he struck down an earlier plan to set a minimum miles-per-gallon rating for taxis.
Both plans were attempts to ensure that taxi owners buy hybrid vehicles, part of the mayor’s broader push to make the city more environmentally friendly. But the proposals were promptly challenged by taxi owners.
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When the city rolls out its share-a-cab program this fall, the solitary taxi ride — and its private, if jerky, moments of contemplation — will yield to the more intimate world of communal travel.
Those seeking a preview of this new regime would do well to seek out its little-known antecedent: a small taxi stand on the far Upper East Side, where Yorkville dwellers pile in four to a car and pay $6 each for a quick, if squished, trip to Wall Street.
The stand is the only one of its kind in Manhattan sanctioned by the city. And after two decades, the peculiar arrangement has given rise to an unspoken and unusual etiquette of cab-taking, a set of customs that may now spread well beyond its origins at York Avenue and 79th Street.
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This cabby is extra careful to avoid potholes — a big bounce could ruin a potential masterwork.
Fabio Peralta has turned the back seat of his yellow cab into an art studio for his passengers, and has commissioned thousands of works.
As soon as a passenger hops into his Crown Vic, Peralta, a 40-year veteran hack, hands the rider a pen and a stack of computer paper.
“I tell them to create art, any kind of art,” he said.
“I don’t care what it is. Whatever comes to their brain, I say.”
Passengers often hesitate at first.
But, incredibly, most put down the BlackBerry, pick up the paper and get to work as Peralta zips through and streets.
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A pedicab driver crashed into a yellow cab after crossing the Williamsburg Bridge into Brooklyn on Wednesday morning, injuring the pedicab driver and two of his three passengers, the police said.
The accident occurred at 7:26 a.m., a witness said. “The pedicab was just coming off the bridge fast,” said the witness, Frank A. Williams, 49. “He drove into the street, straight off the bridge, and hit the cab. Then, when he hit the cab, he just tumbled over. The whole front of the bike caved in.”
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