System to dispatch accessible cabs was found to be underutilized; the cost of a call to hail the specialized cabs: $177.
The Taxi & Limousine Commission acknowledged yesterday the failure of a recently concluded two-year $1 million program to provide dispatch service to wheelchair users.
Hailing accessible cabs has long been nearly impossible due to their rarity, but incredibly, the dispatch initiative did not help.
“Generally the program was very expensive and unfortunately not well-utilized,” TLC head David Yassky told state Assemblymen during a hearing on legislation to require all taxis to accommodate wheelchair-users.
Calls to the dispatcher, expected to average 250 a day, hovered around eight – or about $177 a call. Only 2,701 wheelchair users of an estimated 60,000 citywide used the service.
The program was intended to gauge demand for wheelchair-accessible cabs. Officials had hoped increased demand would spur more taxi owners to outfit their cabs with ramps.
But drivers hated the program, taxi-industry executives said during an Assembly hearing yesterday. A requirement that drivers with accessible cabs enroll in the dispatch program led many to avoid purchasing such cabs altogether. Drivers skipped mandatory training programs on operating wheelchair ramps and ignored calls for rides, preferring instead to be fined.
Wait times for riders using the dispatch service averaged 30 minutes, the TLC says. Dispatchers did not have GPS systems to locate the cabs nearest to customers, although the TLC says that wouldn’t have mattered because cabbies could refuse up to two calls per shift.
Mr. Yassky said the program may have been doomed from the start because many wheelchair users are on fixed incomes and don’t take cabs.
Ethan Gerber, executive director of the Greater New York Taxi Association, whose members operate many of the city’s 240 wheelchair-accessible taxicabs, says the program’s failure was predictable because taxis, unlike livery cars, are designed for street hails, not dispatch service.
Livery cars did not participate in the program. A TLC report on the program is due later this summer.
Can private owner or cabbie believe State Assemblymen held hearing on legisltation to REQUIRE ALL taxis to accommodate wheelchair-users? Holy toledo, add $5,000 to the cost of a brand-new cab!!! Quote: “Generally the program was very expensive & unfortunately not well-utilized,” TLC head David Yassky told state Assemblymen during a HEARING on legislation to require all taxis to accommodate wheelchair-users.”
State Assemblymen need to hold a hearing on legislation to REQUIRE ALL state Assemblymen to get their official duties in order so their elected replacements can take over an organized office. The new elected replacements who know it is foolish and would BREAK THE BACKS of the private owners numbering 4,000 or so medallions. The $5,000 extra per cab will kill them, and all the non-owner cabbies would have to pay yet even higher lease rates to cover the extra $5,000 for a new car, and then lose more pay with the time spent loading with care wheel-chair riders. No matter what it is that comes up that no one else wants to spend time doing, is heaped on the trapeze artist cabbie who has an IV line in his arm 24/7, so all the parasites and greedies can just suck out the blood. Just one more method of sucking out the blood, place the responsibility for wheel-chair rider transportation on cabbies. No matter who it is, elderly can’t walk, drunks can’t walk, sick can’t walk, kids can’t walk – let’s make the cabbies do it!!! Sick, sick, sick. Hey, wait a minute, doctor shortage in operation theatres? Why not the multi-taxking cabbies – surely they could operate on patients, they can do everything else – yet it is only the cabbie in New York City of all the workers in the City and State, who report to their bosses that the toilet is out of orader, who is TOLD: you broke it. It is so sick, so laughable. Why doesn’t Ms. Bhairavi Desai keep sending notarized and registered letters to the TLC asking if they could be on the street to load the wheelchairs into the cabs! Keep these repeated letters in a binder. Ask them to wear Doctor Scrubs as work clothes. Ask them to be sure to have breath mints during hearings. Ridiculous rules is not a one way street, let’s go two ways past Rector St and Albany. Then just one day pick one topic, pull out all the registered letters, and then sue them in court for not answering those letters. Ask them to wear surgeon scrubs in court. Let’s express it another way, the TLC does not have the corner on the ridiculous. Let’s all be forgiven for our ridiculous requirements and requests. Ho ho ho Say, is this a cheese shop? No it isn’t.
To Qnz Girl. Recently an article said an owner had to drive 210 shifts, after which the medallion became unrestricted. So if your mother had driven all those years, and you too, why suddenly did U have to sell the medallion, wasn’t it then unrestricted? TLC has categorized the medallions so many times that it is a Rubic’s cube puzzle to solve.
TLC & machine won’t stop. Next cabbies will be required to take EMT training for their Hack licenses. Transit Connect cabs will be outfited with mini-operating theatre. The cabbie will arrive to take a mini x-ray, set and cast a child’s broken finger. Card charge, you’ll have to run it up front or not get paid. Of course, this will take more time and money from the cabbies’ pay. Boy, the NYC cabbies’ pay must be UNLIMITED, it must be i-infinity!!! There nothing the cabbie trapeze artist cannot be forced to do.
Cabbies, the do-all service guy for all of NYC. Need anything? The miracle worker cabbie will show up to do it. But what makes you think you are good enough for a restroom? Please, miracle worker cabbie, we know if the toilet is broken you did it, and so we won’t fix it!
Surely if London can make all it’s taxis wheelchair accessible, then NYC can also? And their traditional taxi is a genuine passenger car not a converted freight vehicle which most current wheelchair accessible vehicles are. They are an insult to the dignity of disabled knowing they have to be carried in the same type of vehicle as bread and fish.