I had a really interesting conversation tonight with a taxi driver, on the way home from Rob's farewell party in the city. A few of us had been trying to hail cabs for about 10 minutes, but weren't having any luck because none had their "vacant" indicators on, and they rarely stopped (even those without passengers). I quizzed the driver of the taxi I hopped in, and he said it was due to the fact that 3.00am is the changeover time for taxi drivers, so they generally don't pick up people, unless it's on the way home.
What was really interesting is that taxi drivers make judgement calls on the passengers they pick up late at night. It sounds like common sense, but the thought hadn't occurred to me!
Questions like the following are asked:
- Are they drunk?
- What nationality are they? (In my case, the driver thought I was a safe bet since I look sort-of Asian, and therefore wouldn't be that drunk - see (1))
- What suburb are they going to? (According to the driver, North Shore == good, since they don't run away without paying and often tip. The taxi driver had issues with people doing runners at Punchbowl, Dulwich Hill and Cronulla, and said he was less likely to take people to those areas as a result.)
You learn new things every day!
One of the dumbest things about the Sydney taxi system is that they all change shifts at the same time. So if you want to find a cab at 3am or 3pm you have to plan ahead.
Legally, taxi drivers aren’t allowed to pick and choose their fares unless they’re on their way off-shift…
http://www.legislation.nsw.gov.au/fragview/inforce/subordleg 678 2001 pt.3-sec.55 0 N
…but of course many do. When I was in Perth, the driver was allowed to ask for the estimated fare up-front and refuse service if it wasn’t provided, which might help with the problem of people doing a runner, but could also make honest people feel pretty victimised if they happened to live in the wrong suburb.
There’s a pretty good blog by a Sydney cabbie here: http://www.cablog.com.au/
Race/Ethnicity is the first thing people notice when they see someone walking down the street… not sex, height, weight… or so that’s what I heard a long time ago, and I’m assuming the same holds true today.
Also, you should check out Lenny Kravitz’s song Mr. Cab Driver, an ode to racial profiling http://www.tsrocks.com/l/lenny_kravitz_texts/mr_cab_driver.html