Back in October those annoying TaxiTVs installed in every cab in the city started asking riders to answer a few quick survey questions and, shockingly, people answered them. According to the TLC, since the surveys started showing up, 113,000 of them have been taken—and taxi riders turn out to have a lot of dough! more ›

Cabbies really hate the outer boroughs it seems! But they also apparently have gotten quite good at spotting the TLC's enforcement agents whose job it is to ticket them when they refuse rides. So the TLC has gotten clever and hired a bunch of college kids for $10-an-hour to catch hacks who deny service. And the results are depressing—if not surprising to anyone whose ever tried to get a ride over the river. more ›

Over the weekend, rather than push it through the City Council, Bloomberg slipped his controversial-to-cabbies plan to let livery cabs accept street hails outside of Manhattan up to Albany. And while the bill, which just passed in the Assembly, likely won't be voted on in the Senate before this session is over—it increasingly looks like marriage equality might not even see a vote!—that doesn't mean that hacks aren't furious about the plan to flood the streets with 30,000 additional fare-accepting vehicles. Yesterday cabs and cabbies lined up to protest by City Hall and today they've taken their chants of "Hail, No!" to Albany. more ›

Last month Bloomberg announced a plan to legalize hailing livery cabs in outer boroughs—surprising many who thought it already was legal. The idea quickly wracked up fans and detractors alike and now it is time to hash out the details. So, hot on the heels of its Taxi of Tomorrow survey, the TLC is looking for your opinion. more ›

Yesterday afternoon, Mayor Bloomberg announced that every yellow taxi on the streets of NYC will go green under the hood in five years. His latest implementation of PlaNYC involves using requirements set by the Taxi and Limousine Commission to have cab owners upgrade their hacks to hybrid vehicles so that the entire fleet will be hybrid by 2012. Yahoo! exec Patrick Crane was on hand at City Hall to donate ten of the new hybrid vehicles as part of Yahoo!'s green initiatives, which seemed pretty nice, but proved that purple interiors can be a matter of taste. Council Member David Yassky (Brooklyn) has been hailing this issue for the last five years. We're glad he finally managed to flag it down. more ›

"Our taxicabs will be getting a makeover with graphics that communicate passenger information in a better and more uniform way," Taxi and Limousine Commission Chairman Matthew Daus said. more ›

The NY Sun reports that doctors believes less people will suffer "craniofacial injuries" during cab accidents because many new cabs, such as the hybrid taxis, don't have the bullet-proof partitions. Drivers of hybrid cabs, especially luxury ones, have been opting for security cameras. Which could mean less business for plastic surgeons, who say that they see some people with "crushed noses, fractured cheekbones and eye sockets, and 'stellate,' or burst lacerations" after accidents. more ›

Update: some late breaking news-- an LIRR train hit a pedestrian in Queens-- all service on the LIRR is shut down between Penn Station and Jamaica, but the subway is "cross-honoring" LIRR tickets. more ›

sends each co-rider an e-mail and an SMS message with the phone number and first name of the other rider so they can connect to share a cab. more ›

Transportation Alternatives is organizing a rally at City Hall tomorrow at 9AM to "urge Mayor Bloomberg to protect the city's growing number of cyclists." In the past few weeks, there have been three bicyclist deaths and one bicyclist injury from cars. From their press release:

Like the Mayors of London, Paris, Chicago and other world class cities that have recently unveiled comprehensive plans to make bicycling safe and a viable mode of everyday travel for all, Mayor Bloomberg must get serious about making New York City a safe place to bike. The City's "Bicycle Master Plan" is ten years old and only 15% complete. It is devoid of targets, timetables and design standards that cities like London and Chicago are using to make streets safe for the growing number of people who cycle and want to cycle. more ›

The first, and very possibly best, advice we got when we returned to the Big City after our self-imposed exile to the Midwest was twofold: "Don't take taxicabs and don't pay ATM fees." more ›

Who knew that New York City was a Logan's Run for taxicabs? A lot of people apparently because dealing with "out of date" taxis turns out to be a nice subset of the Taxi business. Since 1996, taxis that are a part of a fleet in New York can be no older than three years old. The catch here is that that age limit is only in New York. In lesser cities like, for instance, Chicago, the age limit for taxis is anywhere from two to four years longer. After their time is up, many cabs are stripped down, reworked and moved on out to other pastures. But what exactly does that mean? In today's City section the Times find out by following a cab on the way out: more ›

Geoff Wolinetz, Freelance Satirist more ›

Scott Lapatine, Stereogum.com more ›

Chris Foster, Bluesman more ›

Buboo Kakati, Filmmaker more ›