Malcolm Linskey expects tears. The 70-year-old will retire soon, an event hastened by falling demand for the business he started 30 years ago, Knowledge Point, a training school for London black cab drivers. “It’s crazy, we’re going to be brushed aside”, he says.
The cabby school, London’s largest, is to close its doors in December on the building it has occupied for 26 years in Islington, north London, blaming the twin pressures of Uber and increased property prices.
Mr Linskey says it will continue to produce and sell taxi driver training materials in print and online supplemented by training sessions in church halls and community centres.
Uber, the cut-price taxi app that started in San Francisco, has sparked protests of unfair competition from cab drivers across the world. In May, parts of London were in gridlock following a demonstration by taxi drivers who felt the lack of regulation favoured such “e-hailing” apps.
London cabbies must study “the Knowledge”, learning their way round 25,000 streets as well as all the twists and turns of dead-ends and one-way roads. Before obtaining the green badge, which will license them to pick up fares in London, they will be tested on routes, for example from Manor House to Gibson Square. The school helps aspiring drivers reduce the time — on average about three and a half years — it takes to learn the various routes.
“We can circumnavigate traffic. The Queen might be entertaining China but you might want to get to Victoria to go on holiday,” says Mr Linskey.
In contrast, Uber drivers, typically equipped with a sat nav, are not required to know their way round London’s nooks and crannies.
Uber’s rapid expansion in London contributed to diminished demand for the school’s courses. Mr Linskey nods in the direction of the training room which contains laminated maps of London pinned to desks. There used to be queues to get into the room, which accommodates 40, he says. Now there are 10 to 12 rattling around. “Demand has gone down since Uber arrived. Usually we have 350 students enrolling a year, last year it was 200.”
Among their ranks, he insists, are former Uber drivers tired of working very long hours just to get by. He scoffs at the idea that the flexibility of the internet economy helps self-employed drivers. “They are flexible to work themselves to death.”
A spokesman for the Licensed Taxi Drivers Association, notes that cab-driving has traditionally been a profession passed down from father to son, but says veteran drivers are now advising their children to stay away. “It’s always been a joke that the ‘game’s dead’”, he says. It is no longer a laughing matter, he adds.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/678dc786-7e20-11e5-a1fe-567b37f80b64.html#axzz3qJeV9DrV
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TOYOTA HYBRID TAXI
If you've ever set foot in Tokyo, you know the ubiquitous, straight-laced Toyota Crown Comfort three-box sedans that are as archetypal of Japanese taxis as their drivers' officious hats and dainty white gloves.
But Tokyo's streetscape is about to get a big makeover, and just in time for the 2020 Olympics. Toyota says it will launch a next-generation taxi for Japan in 2018 -- a bulbous, hatchback hybrid.
The new taxi, previewed as the JPN Taxi Concept at last week's Tokyo Motor Show, will be just as idiosyncratic as the Crown Comfort. It starts with the huge greenhouse. A low beltline allows plenty of visibility for driver and passenger alike. And extra-tall side windows in back give tourists a panoramic view. The car also gets a low floor and wide-opening sliding doors.
In a nod to Toyota's green DNA, the taxi is a hybrid, like the flagship Prius. But unlike the Prius, the cab will run on electricity and liquefied petroleum gas, instead of gasoline.
http://www.autonews.com/article/20151102/OEM03/311029975/toyota-to-take-staid-taxi-to-new-heights-by-2018
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