THE UK’s biggest taxi app is coming to Yorkshire, with thecompany behind it confident it can avoid the controversy which has dogged a similar service in London.
Kabx says the app will change the way people book cabs forever.
It was initially launched in Manchester in the summer, and is now available in Leeds, London, Birmingham, Liverpool and Dublin.
The service allows people to ‘jump the queue’ by ordering and tracking a cab on their smartphone.
Kabx has partnerships directly with private hire companies, and says this will mean it can call on a large fleet of cabs.
A similar service, called Uber, operates in London and led to thousands of cabbies in the capital protesting that the mobile app was used to work out the cost of rides.
They said it was tantamount to a taxi meter, which only black cabs are legally entitled to use in London.
Uber’s steady expansion has seen it operate in more than 40 countries, but there have been protests from other drivers, and Berlin recently banned Uber, saying it had concerns for public safety if passengers were transported in ‘unlicensed vehicles’.
Uber has said it will appeal the decision.
The app had earlier been banned in Hamburg over licensing concerns, and there have been other protests in Madrid and Paris.
Earlier this month Margaret Hodge, chairwoman of the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee, wrote to London mayor Boris Johnson demanding to know why Transport for London allowed cars to take bookings through the Uber app without a licence to operate in the capital.
Because the app is operated via a company in the Netherlands, which makes the bookings, takes the payment and issues the receipt, corporation tax is payable in Holland, rather than the UK, she said.
Uber said it complies with all applicable tax laws and pays taxes in all jurisdictions.
Transport for London said its role is to license and regulate the taxi and private hire industry in London and it has no powers in relation to an operator’s corporate structure and how or where they pay tax.
Kabx says it has almost twice as many cabs in its fleet as Uber. It says its partnerships with the private hire companies means it “can call on a much bigger fleet of cabs compared to other taxi apps like the much-talked about Uber, which only has deals with individual drivers”.
When it launched in Manchester it had a fleet of more than 2,000 taxis.
The service works by matching the caller with the cab nearest to their location via their smartphone’s GPS. Users can book the closest cab to them, and get a quote of the cost plus the option of paying by cash or card.
Kabx marketing manager James Kelly said: “The key differentiator of our app is the size of our network. Having so many cars allows us to pick up most customers in just minutes, far faster than the nearest competitor.” The Kabx app is available on both Apple and Android app stores.
TfL has announced that a re-design of a notorious London roundabout will start next year after four fifths of those consulted backed the plans.
The scheme for Elephant’s nothern roundabout entails converting the one-way system to two-way traffic, replacing extensive subways with wide pedestrian crossings, and better interchange between the bus and the tube. TfL is also to investigate the feasibility of limiting the speed limit to 20mph as part of the works.
However, following concerns raised during the consultation, the original proposals for a segregated cycle lane soundbound on the Elephant and Castle link road have been scrapped and replaced with a 4.5m wide bus lane.
This will include new road markings to highlight to cyclists the location of potential conflict points where buses will be pulling in and out of the lane.
TfL will in addition work with Southwark Council and the new shopping centre owners to identify whether footways could be widened, allowing “cycle provision to be reassessed in future”.
Southwark and TfL are also looking at alternative cycling routes on local roads, to see if existing ‘bypass options’ for cyclists avoiding the roundabout can be made more direct.
As I approached Coventry Street late on Thursday night, I observed five minicabs parked behind the Taxi rank with three quarters of their vehicles actually on the pavement.
Amazingly there were four uniformed police officers, complete in hi-visibility coats standing next to the cars, but apparently saying nothing. The officers didn’t seem to be in the least bit fazed by this blatant abuse of pavement obstruction.
I put on the rank and approached the officers. Explaining that in London, since the GLA act of 1974, there has been a blanket ban on cars parked with one or more wheels on the pavement and I politely asked to have these vehicles moved off. One officer said he would attend to this and so I made my way back to my cab.
But as I watched, the officers were approached and spoken to by the doorman from the Lap dancing club, Premium Lace. The officers then retreated back to their original positions. I got back out of my cab and again confronted the officers.
I was told they were unwilling to assist moving the vehicles as they had been given permission “by the door man”, to wait for girls leaving the club as this was a dangerous area. One officer believe it or not, then started to lecture me on the danger of young girls getting into strangers cars in the west end thinking they were, in his words, “Taxis”. I pointed to the rank full of licensed Taxis and said “how hard is it for the doorman to escort the girls the few feet to the point of the rank, should they require a Taxi?”.
The officer just shrugged his shoulders and stood behind his colleagues.
I then asked the assembled officers, when the law had been changed to give doorman the power to give permission to touts to park wherever they like.
I also tried to reason with the officers, but they flatly refused to move on the illegally plying for hire touts.
I spotted three Westminster traffic wardens on the corner of Rupert Street, so I approached and found they were only too pleased to confront the minicabs touts, which quickly sped off. I thanked the wardens and they returned to Rupert Street. But seconds after they turned the corner, a new batch of touts parked on the pavement.
I told the police officers if they wouldn’t help, then I would speak to their sergeant who I could see watching the proceedings, standing by the mobile police HQ on Wardour Street.
I was completely unprepared for what happened next.
I walked up to the sergent and asked if he had a minute. He said “what’s the matter” and I then gave full details of how his officers were refusing to move the offending minicabs parking on the pavement. I also outlined the Act of 1974. He just looked at me and said he had “better things to be getting on with”.
I insisted he enforced the law and reminded him he was a public servant, paid to enforce the law which I now wanted him to do.
Then to my surprise he got very aggressive, started pointing his finger in my face and shouting at me. I reminded him that as a police office he had no right to be this aggressive and shouldn’t be shouting at me in this manner, in a public place. But he just walked away.
I couldn’t take his number, as I had left my glasses in the Taxi. Unfortunately by the time I got back to the cab, retrieved my glasses and armed with a pen and notepad, he had disappeared
So there you have it. Boris’s 100 bobbies on the beat are there for no more than an impotent, hi-vis PR operation, with no intention of being the zero tolerance model of the NYPD this operation was based on.
But More Seriously:
These officers, by giving permission for minicabs to illegally park outside a club, are sanctioning their approval of open touting. By doing so, they are part of the problem of escalating crime, in Central London, instead of being part of a solution.
The safety of the public is being compromised on a nightly basis by the actions (or should I say non actions) of these officers.
We already know TfL enforcement and compliance fail to enforce the Private Hire Vehicles act of 1998, (when it comes to illegal plying for hire). They instead concentrate mainly on Taxi drivers documentation, Badge and Bill checks.
We now have conclusive proof that the Police are turning a blind eye wholesale when it comes to touting and illegally plying for hire and are seemingly aiding and abetting touts and sexual predators alike, in the West End.
With approximately 25 minicab related serious sexual assaults (the Met’s own estimate) happening weekly, this is a shameful affaire.
When questioned about the Met’s non-existent enforcement on radio, the Commissioner, Bernard Hogan-Howe just said, Taxi drivers also commit offences every day and left it there.
Editorial Comment:
Later, I went back and spoke at length with the Doorman of Premium Lace who informed me the club doesn’t have a satellite office licence . He freely admitted quite a few of the cars parking outside his club are touting. While we were speaking, he did ask a number of cars to wait in Rupert Street and said he had inspected their PDAs to make sure they had bookings. But as soon as the booked cars move, they are replaced by touts.
Touts are freely operating, completely unhindered by police officers who just stand about watching and doing nothing.
This is not a victimless crime. It has led to a steep rise in serious sexual assaults including rapes.
Why are Westminster City Council not complaining about the police non-action?
The main reason for the London wide blanket ban on pavement parking is in respect of not only obstruction, but damage caused to pavements, which then have to be repaired at a cost to the rate payers.
Freedom of information searches have shown that the main reason TfL and the Met have not been pursuing legality when it comes to pedicabs, is the matter of cost. Apparently, the do nothing/costs nothing option, is their current choice.
Over the last year many motorised Pedicabs have appeared. Easy to spot by the way the rider doesn’t peddle. The police say they are hard to find, (true I suppose if you walked about with your eyes closed).
We have managed to find where these unlicensed motorised vehicle are stored, recharged and hire out, something the Met has been unable or hasn’t bothered to do.
Below is an excerpt forwarded to the Law Commission by The Met Police:
Safety problems partly derive from the fact that there are no set standards for the construction and use of the pedicab and no set standards for the vetting of operators or riders to check they are suitable.
Many pedicabs fail to have working brakes, lighting or seat belts and the high turnover of employees limits the long-term effects of enforcement.
Common unlawful behaviour includes contravention of one-way streets; riding on the footway; blocking the pavement; parking in bus lanes or on pedestrian crossings, and disobeying red lights.
Blocking of bus lanes is particularly problematic, resulting in delays and disruption to planned bus services through what are generally already busy parts of the town centres in which they operate. Obstruction is also a major issue.
TfL have also provided a number of statistics relating to criminal offences and pedicabs in London, where they are perceived to pose a particular problem.
Statistics from the TfL report include:
Serious sexual assaults by pedicab drivers;
From April 2009 to January 2014, 7 sexual offences have been attributed to pedicabs drivers. (They kept that one quiet!)
A number of thefts and robberies have reportedly been perpetrated by drivers;
There were more than 650 incidents reported in 2013 alone, and twenty injury collisions involving the personal injury lawyer assistance were recorded over the three year period to March 2013.
But…Nothing about the illegal use of motorised rickshaw bikes. Why?
Surely Public Safety Should Come Before Cost?
There are substantial enforcement costs:
From 2010 to January 2014, TfL funded or part funded over 160 operations against pedicabs, at the cost of almost £65,000, resulting in 389 arrests being made by the Metropolitan Police. That’s just 3.74 arrests a week, at a cost of £167 per arrest.
We would assume TfL’s compliance or cab enforcement are not involved in this, as their record on illegal plying for hire and satellite office touting by minicabs is significantly below this.
As for the Metropolitan Police Service, the cost of a targeted operation to deal with pedicabs is currently approximately £1,500 each.
Processing a case is highly time consuming:
Initial arrest and process takes approximately 4-6 hours to the Metropolitan Police Service.
Significant time is spent dealing with the criminal justice system and the administration for the restoration of the seized pedicabs.
So The Met and TfL both know what’s going on, they just don’t know what to do about it.
Cost Benefit Analysis And Summation By Law Commission.
(You couldn’t make this up)
This impact assessment identifies both monetised and non-monetised impacts of intervention, with the aim of understanding the overall impact on society and the wider environment. The costs and benefits of each option are measured against the “do nothing” option.
Impact assessments place a strong emphasis on valuing the costs and benefits in monetary terms (including estimating the value of goods and services that are not traded).
However there are important aspects that cannot sensibly be monetised. These might include impacts on equality, either positive or negative, or enhanced (or diminished) public confidence.
The impact assessment process requires that we make an assessment of the quantifiable costs and benefits even when there is insufficient material on which to base those calculations.
Where possible we have spoken to practitioners to inform our view of the likely aspects to be affected by the change in policy and have used this as the basis for our calculations. Where it has not been possible to obtain a rough indication of numbers in this way we have had to make a realistic estimate.
In such cases, we have taken a conservative approach and have tended to use figures that we considered likely to under-estimate benefits and over-estimate costs
So where they have been unable to acquire true facts and figures….they’ve made them up.
Editorial Conclusion:
Stand by to recieve a recommendation from the Law Commission to licence Rickshaw (Pedicab) vehicles.
TfL would probably issue temporary permits to the riders as well, as a way of raising revenue.
It’s already been alleged that Westminster Council have Traffic Management Orders (TMOs) in place to implement ranks for these bikes, with an eye on selling permits to riders as soon as the recommendations are approved.
So, Licensed Taxi Rank approval = couple of years
Licence Variation for satellite office = just a few weeks
Consulation process was launched in June to improve taxi driver safety
The scene in the James’s Street area of Dublin after a man travelling in a stolen taxi died when it struck a pole in June. Two men have been arrested following another alleged carjacking incident in west Dublin early this morning. Photograph: Niall Carson/PA Wire.
Two men have been arrested following an alleged carjacking incident in west Dublin early this morning.
A taxi driver was held and threatened at knife point by two men at about 4am in the Park West area of Dublin. The taxi driver managed to get out of the vehicle and escape unharmed. The two men drove off in the taxi which was later discovered by gardaí abandoned a short distance from the scene.
Gardaí investigating the incident arrested two men in their 20s in west Dublin a short time later.
Both men have been detained under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act, 1984 at Ballyfermot Garda Station.
The former Minister of State for Public Transport Alan Kelly launched a consultation process in June to improve taxi driver safety following a spate of serious carjacking incidents.
“There have been a number of incidents recently that have highlighted the vulnerable position many taxi drivers are in, especially when they are working late hours and on isolated streets,” Mr Kelly said.
“I think we should be open to all ideas and suggestions and be informed by the views of taxi drivers. I wouldn’t be in favour of a separation partition, but I’d prefer to get the views of taxi drivers and the wider public before coming to a final decision.”
Clear partitions separating the driver front seat area from the remainder of the vehicle are a feature of traditional London black cabs and the instantly recognisable yellow taxis of New York.
Among the other options that could be considered in the consultation process are in-vehicle security cameras and locational alert systems.
There have been at least five relatively high-profile and often violent car jacking incidents of late, most of them in Dublin. A pregnant woman was assaulted in one incident near Mountjoy Square in Dublin.
In another incident, a female passenger was injured when four men involved in a collision with a bus in Rathdrum, Co Wicklow, stole a black Mercedes after it had stopped to lend them assistance.
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