It’s fairly commonplace to not buckle up when riding in a taxi. Yet, taxi drivers (in the US) almost always seem to drive like raging oxen.
I could imagine that sheer experience allows them to drive this way without accidents and that it would be silly for them not to, or it’s just a little known fact that you ACTUALLY ARE in imminent peril of death the instant you step into one.
So what is the actual answer? How do taxi-involved accidents tally up versus other non-drunk drivers?
Not an answer, but anecdotally, I got in a cab in San Francisco driven by a Russian emigré. He was driving like he was in Moscow and I immediately thought, we’re going to get in an accident. I never buckle my seatbelt in taxis just because I don’t have to. I was just about to buckle mine due to the recklessness of driver, and sure as shit, we rear ended a car stopped to park along side Golden Gate Park. I banged up my knee a little but was otherwise unscathed. The taxi was undrivable.
I can’t recall ever being in an American cab in my life. There’s the town car service for getting back and forth to the airport, but those aren’t taxis in the convention sense, and do tend to drive sanely (other than cruising slowly in the left lane, I find).
In Mexico, I’ve been in many, many cabs. Lots of 'em don’t even have seat belts in the back. If they get into a wreck though, (I’m told) that all of their taxi buddies suddenly show up as witnesses, and invariably it’s not the taxista’s fault. Same thing goes for the butt-hole urban bus drivers, too (again, I’m told).
To add another anecdote, I was in a taxi accident. The guy was driving like a lunatic and I buckled my daughter in because of it. About 30 seconds later he clipped a car while trying to pass it on the right and I hit the plexiglass divider with my face.
After a cursory search, this pdf says that medallion cabs in NYC were responsible 14.7% of all crashes in 1999.
Hm, well if we can find out the taxi-cab driver average time on the road per day, and the average person’s average time on the road per day, then we can get an answer.
Or…actually I guess what we need to know is what percentage of cars on the road at any given moment, in New York, are taxi cabs.
Well, it would seem that Manhattan is 50% taxis, and NYC is at least 1/5th (20%) yellow cabs, going by emissions, either of which number is higher than 14.7%.
But, it would appear that the average speed of vehicles in Manhattan is ~8 mph, so this might not be the best city to use as an example. It does look encouraging, though.
I’ve always felt much safer in NYC taxis than foreign ones. The NYC are big chunky cars and they tend to be going the same speed as everyone else. Foreign taxies are usually smaller, and, if they’re going fast, tend to be dodging and weaving around slower traffic.
I’ve driven through Manhattan twice in the past 14 months. We were passing through the area and just had to see the city.
I was surprised at the number of cabs on the street. I’d guess the number has to be close to 50%. The closer you get to Times Square, the more cabs there are.
Both trips were with a friend of mine who used to be a cab driver in New Orleans, so he was paying very close attention to the cabs and the way they were driving.
It’s almost insane how they jump from lane to lane and then stop in traffic to pick up or drop off a fare. (There’s really no place for them to pull over, so the right lane is their best bet…the right lane is also marked “Fire Lane”…I’m not sure if you’re allowed to drive in that lane or what. Maybe a native New Yorker can tell us.)
Most of the cabs are late model Crown Victorias, painted all yellow. We noticed that the bumpers are all scuffed up and some of the cabs had rubber strips glued to the bumpers. I guess if they’re in a tight spot, they don’t take too much time trying to squeeze in or out of a space, they just brush up against the next cab’s bumper.
I once saw a website that was selling or auctioning some retired NYC cabs. The cars were only a few years old and had over 100,000 miles on them and there was a disclaimer that the car and engine would probably need a complete overhaul before they could be used as a daily driver.
Hopefully someone can elaborate on how the taxi system in New York City works.
My (now) wife and I got into a cab at the New Orleans Superdome in the mid-90’s. The place we were was basically a private and deserted road. We got into the cab to meet some very fresh immigrant. He thought the best move was to back straight out at least 1/4 mile at 30+ miles per hour onto an actual 4 lane highway. We panicked as he approached the road but assumed that anyone, yes anyone, would see what was happening. He backed up straight through oncoming traffic into the first two lanes and broadsided another cab in the third line. Oddly enough, neither driver said much although our cab was damaged in the back and the cab we hit had no passengers but was totaled or at least close to it. We didn’t have seat-belts but we were going backwards so that was OK. After the shock wore off, we just got out and flag another cab while the police were responding to the accident.