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Originally Posted by jammies
I doubt very much that, until Uber came along, the majority of council and the bureaucracy gave more than a cursory though to the taxi situation.
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Wrong. The lack of availability of cabs at peak demand times has been an issue in this city for over a decade. Look at the archives of newspapers as far back as the 90s and you'll see columns about the problem. City council has wrangled with the taxi commission for decades.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jammies
Why WOULDN'T they trust the results of these studies? In this particular case, maybe the shouldn't have, but you can't run a city on your gut feel and anecdotal evidence from angry people on the internet.
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Angry people on the internet? People are angry in the real world. And yes, I expect councillors to react to the displeasure of their constituents. That's their job.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jammies
I think there is a vast overestimation of the importance of this issue to your average Calgarian. For every drunk hipster stuck on the side of the road at 2 AM in a blizzard, there's another 99 citizens who take a cab once a year to get to the airport during offpeak hours and never ever see a problem. Nobody has ever gotten elected on challenging "Big Taxi", and assertions to the contrary, no one ever will.
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The same could be said about a great many issues that only bother a minority of Calgarians. Stray cats pooping in gardens. Noise from backyard fire pits. Clearing snow from bike paths. That hasn't stopped council from addressing those issues.
Sure, this may only be an issue to about 20 per cent of Calgarians, who are mostly 18-35. But I'd suggest an issue that affected 20 per cent of Calgarians who are mostly 55-70 would make our politicians jump up and take notice.
And it's not just hipsters who are affected. I've talked to a lot of people who consider the cab situation the worst thing about this city, and the thing that has caused them the most personal aggravation. I'm a 45-year-old suburbanite, and these are some of my experiences with cabs over the last few years:
- Booked a cab to a Christmas party the day before. It was scheduled to arrive at 5:45. By 6:30 it had not arrived, we had no communication of when it might arrive. So my wife and I got my elderly dad to drive us to the party instead. Several of my co-workers couldn't make it to the party at all, even though they booked cabs days in advance.
- Exact same thing happened the next year. Cab was a no-show. Got my dad to drive us again. Again, several co-workers cannot make it because scheduled cabs did not show up. Many Calgary companies holding Christmas parties have resorted to booking hotel rooms for employees because there's no reliable way for employees to get home. That's absurd.
- It's December, -20 out. Spend 30 minutes trying to get a cab to come to the convention centre. Give up and take a train south. Spend 30 minutes at station trying to get through to a cab. Eventually walk into bitter cold and walk up and down Heritage drive waving frantically at any passing. Eventually one stops and agrees to pick us up, but only if we pay cash.
- Friend has a few too many drinks at my place in the burbs and needs to take a cab. After 30 minutes on phone finally book a cab. 40 minutes later it has not shown up. Eventually we walk to the nearest major road and flag down a passing cab after about 30 more minutes. Cabs are extremely reluctant make a pickup at a suburban location at night. So where does that leave people who don't want to drive impaired after visiting friends?
There is no doubt in my mind that the severe shortage of taxis late at night results in hundreds of impaired driving trips every weekend in this city.
And hasn't this city been beating the drum for years about becoming a world-class destination young, urban, talented workers? Isn't that one of the reasons we're doing things like putting in dedicated bike lanes, and spending on public art - to make Calgary a cool and sophisticated destination for knowledge workers? What will those sophisticated young urbanites think the first time they can't get home from a night out because taxi capacity isn't anywhere close to demand on weekends?