Results tagged “newyorkstatefederation”

The police are still looking for the driver who drove a Nissan Altima into 44-year-old taxi driver Mohamed Elwaleed yesterday. Elwaleed was pinned under the car and died, and the driver and his female passenger fled the intersection at Madison Avenue and East 65th Street on the Upper East Side. A witness who was walking his dog at the time told the Post that the cab and Nissan got into an accident near Central Park,...

Mayor Bloomberg announced that the city was prepared for the possible two-day taxi strike that some taxi driver groups have threatened for tomorrow morning, starting at 5AM. About 7,000 of the city's 44,000 taxi drivers (there are about 13,000 cabs in total) have reportedly promised to strike over new technology that the Taxi and Limousine Commission wants to install in all cabs. Some drivers' issues with the technology, which includes GPS tracking systems and credit card payment systems, are that (a) the GPS has no navigational capabilities and (b) when the technology breaks down, the taxi fare meter breaks down, too, costing them money. The city,though, views these measures as necessary customer service initiatives.

If you rely on taxis, you may want to adjust your transportation plans: The Taxi Workers Alliance says that drivers it represents will strike on September 5 and 6 to protest the Taxi and Limousine Commission's decision to add GPS systems to all yellow cabs. But then the New York State Federation of Taxi Drivers, another advocacy group, said that there would be no strike (with spokesman Fernando Mateo saying, "Read my lips: There will be no strike."). Our thoughts: Pray there's no unusual weather event and take mass transit or your bike.

The Daily News reports that there's a new scholarship program to help women become taxi drivers. The Metropolitan Taxicab Board of Trade, New York State Federation of Taxi Drivers, has 500 scholarships to offer, but only 8 women have signed up, something the federation's president chalks up to lack of awareness for the program and as well as old perceptions that being a cab driver is dangerous. Really, who knew? The Daily News says that 99% of taxi drivers are men and we believe it: Whenever we get a female cab driver, we do a double take and start to wonder if she really enjoys it. The female cab drivers we've had have generally been very pleasant and nice - though we realize it's a smaller sample size - so we're all for more female cab drivers.
Which brings Gothamist to Taxi, starring Queen Latifah and Jimmy Fallon. We saw a trailer for the film before Anchorman. Now, there's nothing better than seeing Jimmy Fallon humiliated, but the movie doesn't seem to make sense. Queen Latifah plays a no-nonsense cab driver, who helps out disgraced rookie cop Jimmy, while pursuing bank robbers, and QL has this pimped out cab...didn't Hollywood learn their lesson about a multi-racial, TV-star-paired-with-singer-actress with DC Cab? Maybe it's an excuse to see Gisele Bundchen onscreen, but it's just bad idea jeans, even if it was shot in NYC. And if you watch the trailer, there was one thing Gothamist liked: The title treatment, which has a pulsating/radiating Manhattan street grid in the background.

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