BIRMINGHAM

A taxi driver caught using his mobile phone behind the wheel is one of the first to receive six points on his licence after a new stricter law came into force on Wednesday.

Central Motorway Police Group tweeted they had stopped a private hire driver in Birmingham city centre.

The new rules came into effect on March 1, meaning all motorists will now receive six penalty points and a £200 fine if caught - previously drivers would receive three points and £100 penalty.

CMPG tweeted: “Birmingham city centre. Private hire driver stopped using his mobile phone whilst driving. #DontStreamAndDrive #noexcuses #6points”

Solihull Partnership said they had also issued nine tickets.

They said: “The 1st day of new legislation for using mobile phone when driving 9 tickets issued to motorists #no excuse.”

Police forces are carrying out a seven-day crackdown with extra patrols and an “increased focus” on catching drivers using hand-held phones.

A similar operation last month saw 3,600 motorists given penalty notices.

The changes are set to have a significant impact on young drivers in particular, as they risk having their driving licence revoked following a first offence.

http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/taxi-driver-caught-using-mobile-12675312
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BEIJING DRIVERS ARE FREEZING

Beijing had the best of intentions when it started to promote all-electric taxis in 2011. Not only would the green cars reduce the city's choking pollution, but they'd highlight its commitment to becoming a center of innovation. There was just one problem: cold weather.

Electric cars lose their charge quickly when temperatures drop, reducing their range, utility and -- for taxi drivers -- profitability. Just ask the unlucky souls driving them around Beijing this winter. According to local news media, they're shutting off battery-draining heaters and driving in heavy boots that -- thanks to fares lost while charging their batteries -- they can't really afford.

With a laudable commitment to the environment, Beijing still plans to replace the city's entire fleet of 67,000 gas-powered taxis with greener ones. But as with so many of China's renewable-energy initiatives, this one prioritizes symbolism and publicity over planning and practicality. The results are likely to be disappointing.

Beijing's experiment started modestly enough, six years ago, with the introduction of 50 electric taxis in the suburbs. By the end of 2013, there were 1,000. But they didn't come cheap. In many areas, the favored vehicle was the Beiqi, made by state-owned Beijing Automotive Group Co., which cost as much as $35,000, compared to less than $10,000 for a comparable gas-powered car.

Another problem was that the number of charging stations around the city failed to keep up with demand. In 2014, there were 539 of them for 1,150 electric taxis. But thanks to the rapidly expanding number of private electric cars -- Beijing added 51,000 in 2016 alone -- that soon proved inadequate. One result was that taxi fleets spent half their time charging, with a typical wait time of two to three hours.

That's a real hardship for drivers. According to China's Economic Observer newspaper, a fully charged Beijing electric taxi has a range of about 90 miles. That's not far in a city where a daily commute averages 23 miles. And it gets worse with age: Drivers report that a year-old taxi's range drops to around 60 miles, and some older ones struggle to reach 30. A study last year found that the city's electric taxis average two charges, two trips and a mere 72 miles a day.

Unsurprisingly, many drivers want out. At Beijing Yinjian Taxi, the city's largest vendor, monthly rents for the cars have fallen from $1,000 in 2014 to as little as $300 today, as cabbies prove harder to attract. Although the city government is offering a $200 monthly subsidy to drivers who work a set number of hours in an electric taxi, there aren't many takers so far.

For a program with such admirable goals, that's disappointing -- but not unusual. In its impatient drive to become a leader in renewable energy and conservation, China often underinvests in the infrastructure needed to realize its ambitions.

Much of the energy generated by China's wind-power turbines, for instance, never reaches consumers because the electric grid lacks the capacity to transmit it. In one province, fully 43 percent of generated wind power goes nowhere.

The situation is similar in solar, where a significant amount of new capacity isn't even hooked up to the grid. In sunny, vast Xinjiang Province, more than half the solar power generated simply goes to waste.

If China continues to approach renewable energy this way, it isn't going to get very far. A better approach is to be, frankly, a little boring. Start by building up public works, such as power grids and charging stations, before imposing new-energy requirements and technologies.

Amsterdam became a world leader in electric car use partly by installing charging stations on a large scale and shifting to electric public transit. It also established one of the world's few successful electric taxi fleets by giving drivers exclusive rights to pick up passengers from Schiphol Airport, where fast energy chargers are now waiting to cater to them.

That's doesn't sound quite as impressive as electrifying every taxi in an Asian megalopolis where the population exceeds 20 million. But it does help ensure that local cabbies aren't freezing behind the wheel.

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-03-02/why-are-beijing-s-taxi-drivers-freezing
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WORCESTER

NO further action is being taken against a man arrested for an alleged race attack outside Shrub Hill Station.

The 18-year-old, from Worcester, was arrested on suspicion of racially or religiously aggravated assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

He was arrested and held on police bail, after Sajid Bhatti was attacked outside the railway station on New Year's Eve.

Mr Bhatti, a taxi driver, suffered a fractured skull, an eye haemorrhage and a broken nose in the attack.

The 33-year-old father, from Pakistan, said he was parked in the taxi rank when a group of men targeted his vehicle.

A 16-year-old and another 18-year-old, both from Worcester, were also arrested in relation to the attack and have been rebailed until Wednesday, March 29.

http://bit.ly/2lfB37l
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Taxi drivers and business leaders have added their voices to the growing campaign calling on ministers to introduce a diesel scrappage scheme to tackle dangerous levels of air pollution.

A broad alliance of business organisations and environmental charities has written to the chancellor, Philip Hammond, urging him to introduce a system in next week’s budget to compensate motorists switching from diesel to more environmentally friendly vehicles.

Senior MPs, environmental groups and doctors are part of the coalition which says a scrappage scheme is essential if the government is to alleviate the air pollution crisis affecting many towns and cities in the UK.

The letter – signed by organisations including the Federation of Small Businesses, London First, Greenpeace and the Licensed Taxi Drivers’ Association (LTDA) – supports proposals put forward by the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, for a national diesel scrappage fund that he argues would financially compensate motorists and enable the government to get a grip on illegal levels of toxic air.

The move comes as environmental experts and senior politicians warn that the toxic air is having a major impact on people’s health in towns and cities across the UK – not just in London.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/mar/01/taxi-drivers-and-business-leaders-call-for-diesel-scrappage-scheme 
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Inverness taxi drivers have warned of a “potentially catastrophic” impact to the trade caused by new charge rises which they say are “patently unfair” on the public.

However, the Inverness Taxi Alliance has decided against appealing the changes proposed by Highland Council.

The group, which represents independent drivers in the Highland capital, met on Monday evening and agreed not to appeal to the Traffic Commissioner about the proposal.

The group appealed a previous proposed fare rise in 2015 which they felt was not high enough.
The appeal was found in their favour after it was ruled that the council had not consulted widely enough, meaning the process had to start all over again.

Despite their decision not to appeal, the taxi alliance also warned about the prospect of an appeal from elsewhere in the Highlands.

A letter issued yesterday by the group’s chairman, Andrew MacDonald, and vice-chairman Duncan Fraser set out their concerns. They said: “The meeting decided that because of the timeframe that an appeal would take and the interim suspension of any part of the review, together with the effect of denying the trade any kind of increase in their earnings that it would be, overall, a detriment to appeal at this stage.

“Notwithstanding, there may already be an appeal lodged from another area in Highland.
“The meeting did, however, agree unanimously that several aspects of the agreed review were potentially catastrophic to the trade and patently unfair to the public.”

Key elements of the council’s changes to the taxi tariff include raising the basic running mileage from £1.40 to £1.50 per mile. Waiting time costs will also be increased from £18 to £25 per hour and soiling charges will also be increased.

Supplementary charges will also be introduced for people who live more than three miles from the taxi base or where the car is when it is dispatched.
The changes will be implemented later this month, pending any possible appeals.

The taxi alliance also reiterated long-held concerns about proliferation of private hire cars in the city, as opposed to taxis which are allowed to sit on a rank.

The letter was copied to the chief executive of Highland Council, Steve Barron, asking for “meaningful dialogue and compromise” between the local authority and the trade.

The council’s licensing chairman, Councillor Ian Cockburn, said that the taxi alliance should contact him directly with any concerns.

http://bit.ly/2lfG4g4
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Uber competitor Lyft is pitching investors on a new funding round and hopes to net at least $500 million, according to a source familiar with the matter.

The $500 million fundraising would value the ride-hailing service between $6 billion and $7 billion, the source said.

A Lyft spokeswoman declined to comment.
Lyft's fundraising efforts have been ongoing for months, and the company retained Qatalyst Partners in part to assist them in raising a fresh round of cash, according to other sources with knowledge of the matter.

Larger ride-hailing competitors, Uber and Didi, have raised so much money that Lyft's options of finding new investors who can write big checks are quite limited.

Uber is valued at about $70 billion and Didi's valuation is about $35 billion after its merger with Uber's China operations in August.

http://reut.rs/2mO0zgd 
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