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Martin Underwood · October 26th 06, 12:59 PM posted to uk.transport.london

Boltar wrote in message
:

Mike Hughes wrote:
Indeed, London transport couldn't get their staff in and out of work
when the tubes are shut without taxis, many local authorities
wouldn't be able to get their disabled residents to and from
hospital, etc. without having to provide expensive alternatives to
taxis which are available 24/7

I'm talking about black cabs , not minicabs. I can't see many black
cab drivers working at 3 in the morning without charging an arm and
a leg.

Agreed, but they can have them outside the 'rush' hours.

So limit black cabs to outside rush hours too if they're only
important when public transport isn't running.

So when public transport is running, people who are making a door-to-door
journey should be forced to make a less convenient journey from start
address to departure station (bus/railway) to destination station (maybe
with changes along the way) to destination address? Even when they are
disabled or have large amounts of shopping? Even if a taxi may provide a
quicker journey?

I see nothing wrong with black-cab taxis. On the occasions when I've driven
in London, I've found that they are almost always courteous and considerate
to other motorists (eg myself) and usually indicate their intentions. If I'm
following a black cab, I usually know that if I stay behind him and change
lanes when he does I'll get there faster because he knows the places where
the left lane becomes left-turn-only or becomes a place for residents to
park instead of a through lane. Yes, they sometimes do U turns in places
that I wouldn't, but that's because they have a turning circle to die for!
If I see a taxi parked at the side of the road with his right indicator
going, I tend to plan for him doing a U turn in front of me rather than just
pulling out ahead of me in the same direction. I let black cabs pull out in
front of me more often than I would let anyone else do (in the same way as I
would for buses) because I know that they are driving for a living and that
time is money: just as buses have a timetable to keep to, taxis need to fit
in as many calls as possible in the day, even if the fare that they charge a
given passenger will be the same no matter how long the journey takes.

Minicabs of the Fred's Taxis type tend to be much less considerate - less
likely to indicate, more likely to stop without giving warning, more likely
to try to drive aggressively, less tolerant of strangers to a place.

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