The five-borough taxi plan sounds fair to me. If yellow cabbies are so concerned with losing money, they shouldn't be so selective about who they pick up and drop off. The people of New York City need service, and if livery drivers are the ones who are willing to provide it, then make it legal for them to pick up street hails.

The Taxi and Limousine Commission held the first of two required public hearings today on its five-borough taxi plan. The plan, supported by Mayor Bloomberg and approved by the State legislature and Governor Cuomo, will allow livery cab drivers to pick up street hails in Brooklyn, Queens, except for the airports, the Bronx, Staten Island and Manhattan, north of West 110th Street and East 96th Street. Despite many lawmakers’ and residents’ support, yellow taxi fleet owners still oppose the plan, fearing it will cost them riders and dollars.

The TLC also released draft rules for drivers obtaining the new Street Hail Livery License. The City will issue 18 thousand of these special "hail" licenses over the next three years, and twenty percent of the permits will be for wheelchair accessible vehicles. The first 6,000 permits are scheduled to be sold this June.

Are you hailing the five-borough taxi plan? How will it affect the way you get around town? What would you say about the proposal if you attended a public hearing? Will drivers’ and commuters’ opinions be heard?

I opposed this from the beginning because we have had access to our own neighborhood private cab service for years and years and never had a problem.

I don’t support it at all because now I can’t get a cab because I don’t know who they are and I have no idea why anyone that doesn’t live in the outer boroughs can keep making rules and laws that don’t even consider our needs at all.

I do know that there must be some secret society that can get in on all of these free bee rides which are known as numbered accounts and then they also have access-a-ride and I might add that the access-a-ride vans that go by are usually empty. I myself have to go to a doctors office maybe every two or three months and the office is in Yonkers and I pay going and coming back and someone had better straighten this out because I had to miss my last appointment because of someone that knows nothing about how we have to live to get around in the boroughs and this is our lifeline without a car.

Someone out of all of these people in the city council that sit around voting all kinds of nonsense and never give a tax paying citizen even a thought as to how they can make life easier for them.

Something is really wrong somewhere.

I ALWAYS SAY WE MIGHT BE ABLE TO GET TO WHERE WE ARE GOING BUT HOW DO WE GET BACK HOME. THAT’S THEY SHOULD HAVE LEFT WELL ENOUGH ALONE WITH THE PRIVATE CAB COMPANIES. I WORKED IN THE COURT AND TOOK A CAB EVERY MORNING AND USED LOCALLY FOR YEARS AND YEARS SO SOMEBODY HAD BETTER GIVE IT A THOUGHT.

maxxiee
mp

What these taxi companies don't understand is that the livery or gypsy cabs are picking up people uptown and in the outerboroughs

Another thing If yellow taxis are so concerned with loosing income why is it a problem for them to go to the outer Burroughs without a fight

Jim UWS

“It doesn’t matta!” With all of these illegal cabs and “dollar vans” on the streets STEALING money from the MTA and people of the city of New York, it doesn’t matter if livery cabs are in outer boros because its already happened. Now the city wants to make it “legal” for these cabs to do this? I feel bad for the poor suckers who are ligit and have hack licenses and TL&C permits.

Patrick “The Truth”
Carroll Gardens.

I'm all for the new plan, but, with so many livery cabbies cruising for street hails, will this affect the availability and response time for pick-ups by local car services? Will metered rates be different from the zone rates currently in use?

And, while it's great that so many wheelchair accessible cars will be added to our streets, what will be the impact on the City's lower-priced Access-a-Ride program and those who use it? My guess is that, if the NYCTA contracts out some of the AAR bookings to the cabs instead of the more costly vans, there will be significant per passenger savings.

BIG ANDY
Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn

Why, why, why and a thousand more why’s is the government running transportation systems? Why can’t we have a free market in transportation? Why must every one suffer from the cockamamie ideas of inept politicians?

Tell the government transportation hacks to go to hail.

Joe
Port Richmond, SI

Where I currently work, in Forest Hills, there are livery cab spots everywhere. With the way it currently stands, I absolutely hate it. After 9pm, I feel like a street walker with how often I get honked at, called at for a cab, and even see cab drivers jump out of their cars and start fighting one another for street fares. They even stop in front of me in the middle of Queens blvd to try and get my attention when I'm walking to my bus.

I try to call my trusted and local cab companies by phone.

Anne, Fresh Meadows - Queens.

I live halfway between Manhattan and the airports, and the fact that I've had a yellow taxi deny me a ride from Manhattan to my home in the middle of the day just because the dingus driver was inconvenient would make me want to support the livery cabs.

Hanley

I welcome the street hails for the neighborhood cabs. I live on the north west side and yellow cabs still disrespect non white customers.

They don't unlock the doors until you tell you where you are going. They always getting off and heading down town. So if we can get the same service from a non yellow cab I am all for it.

Lynnitaw

The thing to do is to ban ALL cars from Manhattan, including cabs with their rip-off prices and nasty drivers, and bring back the non-polluting 24/7 Trolley Cars in every borough.

1) Tons of jobs would be created to get the trolleys up and running

2) That ominous brown cloud that hovers over Manhattan would disappear, and asthma rates would drop

3) Gasoline in the metro area would drop to $1 per gallon

4) The trolleys would also replace polluting buses

5) With no cars creating traffic jams, trolleys would have a 99% on time schedule

6) etc., etc., etc.

Regards,
Walter,
New Dorp