City's Taxi Fleet Will Turn Hybrid

Someone should mention to the Taxicab Board of Trade that maybe if New York cabbies didn't drive like drunken lunatics 100% of the time, they might need to worry less about the accident safety rating of their vehicles.

I applaud any and all efforts to push through more and more hybrids and other fuel-efficient cars ... although it cracks me up that 25-30 mpg is still considered "good" by anyone. We should be way above that by now, but the auto industry's sat on its ass for the last 30 years.

To heck with hybrids. Change the mileage limits so we can get us some London Taxis!

They're reasonably fuel efficient (not as much as a Prius, but thanks to the efficiency of diesel engines they're probably about as good as most other gasoline hybirds), they have incredible amounts of passenger space, a tight turning radius, they're handicapped accessible and they last twice as long as a Crown Vic.

But we don't have them because they also cost twice as much as a Crown Vic, and the current mileage limits won't allow fleet owners to get the full lifespan out of them before they're forced to retire them.

I had a cabbie say just the other day "I hit 4-5 People a Week" as he was yelling at someone that cut him off... Being in a crown vic I felt ok, if I was in a hybrid I would have freaked. On the other hand I'll all about making the cars less wasteful..

Ding Dong, the Crown Vic is dead,
The big and dirty Crown Vic is dead,
Ding dong, the evil Crown Vic is dead!

This is great. Hybrids will be fabulous as city cabs because most of them turn off their engines when the car is stationary or just moving slowly, which means ZERO emissions and noise a large part of the time. There's no reason we should have giant Ford V8's getting 12 MPG all over the city.

And cars like the Prius are extremely reliable, I would bet much more so than a Crown Vic. Ford shareholders must be shitting bricks.

Unbelievable that none of the posters here seem to care about occupant safety! (....or the environmental mess in acquiring all the raw materials for the gas-electric hybrids' batteries)
I hope they at least shun those Prius' for a vehicle with some luggage space... Something made by an American company would be nice too.

Hybrids, like most cars, aren't very efficient under 15 mph and in stop-and-go traffic of which NYC as quite a bit. Too bad most NYCers are more concerned with how they perceived riding in a hybrid cab and too few seem to care about science.

Glenn -

As an occupant, I care about occupant safety, but the simple fact of the matter is that the correct and proper approach to safety is avoidance and prevention, not making sure you're wrapped in enough steel so that when you crash into something, you don't get as badly hurt.

If taxi drivers didn't constantly speed, cut each other off, drive in the middle of two lanes, and numerous other infractions, they wouldn't get into so many accidents. They'll try and blame it on the non-taxi vehicles and their behavior, of course, but the truth is that taxis make up the vast, vast majority of traffic safety violations you see on any given day in this city. If a traffic cop felt like it, he could meet his ticket quota for the month in a single day just ticketing cabs.

I agree, CW. When the first hybrids started coming out, some cab companies were praising them because they weren't overpowered like the Crown Vic. The benefit is twofold: (1) the car gets less wear and tear and (2) is safer to drive. You can't drive like a maniac if the car doesn't have the power to do so. The Crown Vic was great as a police cruiser -- durable and suitable for high-speed police work -- but lousy as a cab.

Good riddance to the Crown Vic.

They just also eliminated the mileage exemptions for the minivan cabs (which was basically the only economical reason to have them). I think the minivans make excellent cabs. The footprint is basically the same, but getting in and out, roominess, and the ride is so much better. Unfortunately, repairs are said to be very expensive. Now if they could make a minivan hybrid....

TK - hybrids are MOST efficient in city traffic since they (a) turn off their engines when not moving and (b) regenerate more energy from frequent braking/deceleration. That's why hybrids often have higher EPA ratings for City MPG than Highway.

Anyways, what decade are the TLC and fleet owners living in? The Crown Vic's one advantage is cheap parts and they're simple to build but they're simply ridiculously outdated. And they don't score particularly well in crash tests (Good/Acceptable front, Marginal/Poor side impact). The reduced cost of fuel should more than make up for repair costs...

Check the link below for the study which shows cabbies to have less accidents per miles driven than other groups of drivers, this despite the inherently unsafe nature of the business of pulling up to and pulling away from curbs in streaming traffic a hundred times a night.

Which is not to discount the anecdotal evidence completely, or ignore everyone's favorite crappiest cab ride ever stories, but as always there's never any consideration for the job itself. Imagine the chaos that would ensue if a subway engineer had to pay to work, and then received cash at shift's end based on how fast he plowed the train through the system.

That said, the city and the medallion owners have forged an unholy pact in which the labor pool for drivers fits the cliche: a recently arrived immigrant, with little or no city driving chops and very little knowledge of NYC. The owners want the bar to be set as low as possible so it will always be easy to replace one driver with the next guy. Everybody would benefit from a system in which only the most qualified, knowledgeable, articulate and safe workers were attracted to the business, and stayed at it with a livable pay scale. The owners don't care if you have that, the city doesn't care, either; re-direct the splenetic prose towards them, not the guy behind the wheel.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/28/nyregion/28cabs.html

just as well, because they don't make crown vics anymore. I think 07 was the last year for them. (same for towncars and grand marquis)