Closing Bell: Taxis for All (Boroughs)
Most Brooklynites (and other outer borough residents) don’t even think of hailing a yellow cab as a possibility given their relative scarcity and reluctance of drivers to pick up any rider that might divert them from the most direct course back to Manhattan. That may start to change now that former Brooklyn Heights Council Member…
Most Brooklynites (and other outer borough residents) don’t even think of hailing a yellow cab as a possibility given their relative scarcity and reluctance of drivers to pick up any rider that might divert them from the most direct course back to Manhattan. That may start to change now that former Brooklyn Heights Council Member David Yassky has been crowned the grand poobah of the Taxi and Limousine Commission, reports The Times. Having represented for eight years a district in Brooklyn, I know many residents in the city, particularly outside the core business district of Manhattan and nearby neighborhoods, feel yellow cab service is concentrated there, Mr. Yassky said. In fact, it is.
Photo by sunpig
Brooklyn Heights / Cobble Hill area is pretty well served by yellow taxis, and the cabbies usually know their way around there.
Personally I’ll side with the cab drivers on when they want to change their shift, they have a tough gig.
Which car services are you all using?? We haven’t found car services are cheaper than yellow cabs. Arecibo charges $10 to drive 5 minutes to Park Slope from PLG. This gives me opportunity to vent about something – they need to change the time the cabs change shifts because it impacts those in Brooklyn very unfairly. I’m sorry, but who cares when the drives want to change shifts, it’s supposed to be about the people who use the service not the drivers. It was explained to me by a driver that shifts change at 5pm, in the middle of rush hour, because the night shift drivers want the dinner crowd. Uh, okay, right, that’s way more important than serving the people of NYC properly. I was in Manhattan after seeing my doctor, in horrible pain with a muscle spasm, and 4 cabs in a row refused to go to Brooklyn because it was 4pm and they’d have to be in Queens by 5pm. They didn’t even care when I told them how much pain I was in. The whole shift system is retarded.
both clinton street and roebling street are very reliable for just standing there. in WB, cabs are usually around on most major streets. going in to the city, take them for sure because they are a buck or 2 cheaper than car services. agree about northside tho – fast, good cars, and still cheap. have an acct. there actually. they pick me up at work in the city at least 2-3 times per week.
Yeah… if we have a GPS map in the back seat, why don’t the taxi drivers have this up front?!
Oh yeah – and I don’t expect anything to change. The easy money is in Manhattan. The same reason all of the hot dog vendors are in Central Park and only 1 or 2 (at most) will waste their vendor license on Prospect Park!
And you don’t have to tell them how to get where you are going. None of the taxi drivers have a clue about Brooklyn.
What I actually like about car services (as compared to taxis) is that you can just get in and it doesn’t matter what happens…. he drives some fucked up route, there’s traffic, etc etc. It’s the same price! When I take a taxi I am just anxious the whole time watching my wallet empty on the little dashboard-mounted money sucker.
The shitty thing is folks from out of town (or even out of the borough) or people new to Brooklyn don’t have a laundry list of cars to call… they’re basically screwed.
Always thought it was “ironic” that half the cars in the yellow cab fleet are from garages in Brooklyn, but .
Dave, I though hedge fund guys had their own drivers.
You flag down random car service guys in central Brooklyn?
Oy.
don’t expect any changes. yassky’s a wuss