Tourist Paid $90 for 15 Block Pedicab Ride

(Gerry Visco's Flickr)

On Monday the City Council will debate new regulations that would require pedicab operators who charge a flat rate to disclose, in writing, how much they intend to charge for their service. One of the bill's main sponsors, Councilman Dan Garodnick (D-Manhattan), says the legislation is motivated in part by horror stories of tourists getting Shanghaied by pedicab drivers who take them for a ride in more ways than one.

"What prompted it was a terrible story of a tourist family from Baton Rouge that got charged to go from Strawberry Fields [in Central Park at West 72nd Street] to 59th and Sixth—$90," Garodnick tells the Post. "In-sane! It's so close!" A yellow cab would cost around $8 for a similar trip, but in a taxi you just don't get the same satisfaction of watching a human being physically exert themselves because you're too lazy to walk to the ESPN Zone.

Legislation passed in 2007 forced pedicabs to display their rates if they charge by per block or by the minute. (Some charge $1 a minute.) But pedicabs that charge a flat rate are exempt, and don't need to disclose their fee up front. Garodnick's bill would require all pedicab drivers to give customers a receipt with the price, license number, their names, and a license and phone number for the business they work for. Those who charge by the mile or minute would also have to display a timer or odometer. At press time, it was unclear how the new rules would effect Spider-Man pedicab parkour operators.

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By John Del Signore in News on June 10, 2011 6:38 PM

Comments [rss]

wss233

Sounds like a fair price to me. I'm sure that the whiny hicks were all fatties anyway, like a greasy order of human Tater Tots stuffed in the back of his rickshaw. It must have been hard work to pedal! And can you imagine what their conversation must have been like? Probably the whole bunch of them loudly trying to recount in their halting way the plot of a recent gray's anatomy episode. Excruciating.

It's good to see clever New Yorkers sticking it to a pack of bumbling rubes from the sticks.

hb78

Were they tourists from another planet? No. They should have enough sense to ask how much something is going to cost. That's like going to a restaurant where the tableware is plated in gold and everyone around you is lighting cigars with $100 bills but you act surprised that your bill is a couple of g's after you order the whole menu. I'm tired of the "dumb human" excuse for everything.

Jesse James Payette-Steinberg

Sounds like the pedicab driver from Montreal lol

Bruce Goldensteinberg

Send these disgusting pedicab drivers back to eastern europe. They are dirty and smell and are con artists.

whatidsay

Pray tell, can you describe for us the last time you rode in one to arrive at that opinion? Sit your ass in one before you start talking out of it.

Bruce Goldensteinberg

Why would I want to ride in one of them? The drivers constantly break the law, endangering their occupants, pedestrians, bike riders and drivers. Send them home. America is full.

WetButt

and pay $90 to confirm the obvious? no thx

Rocknrope

Who doesn't ask how much a service is going to cost before committing to it? Tourists.

Jibreel K Riley

in Boston it was just how much you was willing to give, from Fenway back to Mass Ave Green Line Station you'll get $10 to $20 spot and I have a chitty personality however you ride in the darn things because you look cool however beyond that, I'll never do that chit again

virgilstarkwell

"A yellow cab would cost around $8 for a similar trip, but in a taxi you just don't get the same satisfaction of watching a human being physically exert themselves because you're too lazy to walk to the ESPN Zone."

it's not surprising that, even in a story about blatant cheating, you find a way to be snarkily pro-bike.