Results tagged “taxicabcommission”

Federal authorities have arrested 27 people so far in a massive bribery case tied to the D.C. taxicab industry. Two indictments released today accuse a total of 39 individuals of conspiring to bribe city officials in order to obtain fraudulent taxi licenses between 2007 and 2009.

More than two dozen people have been indicted in the rapidly expanding federal bribery investigation into the D.C. taxi industry, the Post's Del Quentin Wilber is reporting. That's a whole lotta people. So who, besides Ted Loza, are they? They're "cab drivers or others with financial ties to the industry," most of whom will probably be arrested today, according to anonymous sources. Keep your eye out for handcuffed cab drivers this afternoon!

Perhaps it was WTOP's reporting that did it — they seem to think so. Or maybe the D.C. Taxicab Commission spent some time reading your comments and noticed that they haven't got a lot of fans these days. Either way, the $1 fuel surcharge will disappear starting at 12:01 a.m. on Thursday.

WTOP's Adam Tuss managed to get D.C. Taxicab Commission Chairman Leon Swain on the record that he's now officially "trying to get rid of the [gas] surcharge." Trying? He's also apparently "trying" to contact members of the taxicab commission so that he can talk to them about repealing the surcharge. "I expect to take action this week," Swain told Tuss. Hmm. You may recall that FOX 5's Matt Ackland asked Swain the same question on Oct. 29, noting that gas prices had fallen and were expected to keep falling. Since then, there was a regular, full meeting of the D.C. Taxicab Commission on Nov. 12. What prevented this discussion from happening at that meeting? Average gas prices in the metro area now stand at $1.91. When the $1 gas surcharge we're paying right now was reinstated in late 2007, average gas prices were around $3.13 per gallon. The Commission approved the most recent surcharge renewal on Sept. 29, extending it through January 31, 2009.

FOX 5's Matt Ackland had the smart idea to ask D.C. Taxicab Commission Chairman Leon Swain whether falling gas prices will mean an end to the $1 gas surcharge we've all been paying for such a long time now.

Given the record high gasoline prices consumers are paying at the pump right now, it's not terribly surprising that the D.C. Taxicab Commission took "emergency action" this week to extend the expiration date of the current $1 per trip gas surcharge by another 120 days. The previous gas surcharge, which was also an "emergency" extension, went into effect at the end of January and expired on May 28.

The people behind DC Residents for Reasonable Taxi Fares, the web site that's been calling for Mayor Fenty to make some significant revisions to his taxi meter proposals, have sent out a last-minute push for residents to send like-minded input to the District. The deadline for public comment set by the D.C. Taxicab Commission on the proposed move from zones to time and distance meters, which Mayor Fenty has said would include a $4.50$4.00 flag drop, are due Monday, Jan. 7.

The Washington Post says that taxicab drivers are handing out surveys to riders about the impending change from zones to meters. Drivers have until Jan. 8 to hand in public comments to the D.C. Taxicab Commission and the mayor's office, which means that if you get in a D.C. cab between now and then, odds are pretty good you'll be asked to complete a survey.

If you've taken a D.C. taxicab since the stroke of midnight last night, you may have been surprised by a cab driver insisting that you pay an extra $1 gas surcharge. Didn't the gas surcharge expire in September? It did, but last week the D.C. Taxicab Commission quietly passed an emergency measure to bring back the $1 fee, beginning at 12:01 a.m. this morning and lasting until 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, January 29, 2008. “Prices...

Given his position as chairman of the committee that oversees transportation and the D.C. Taxicab Commission, we knew headline-loving Ward 1 D.C. Council member Jim Graham wouldn't pass up an opportunity to create his own spectacle in the wake of Mayor Adrian Fenty's announcement about the transition to taxi meters. But it seems as though Graham was only able to muster up the resources to put together a 2 p.m. public roundtable at the Wilson...

>> Mayor Fenty has changed his mind and now says emails to and from city officials will be kept indefinitely. [WTOP] >> More Fenty decisions! He's considering a drastic change to the role of the hated D.C. Taxicab Commission. [Examiner] >> Several people on a Boston-bound flight out of DCA were taken to a hospital after complaining of feeling sick and were found to have elevated carbon monoxide levels. [WCVB] >> Jack Bauer spotted in...

D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty announced this afternoon that new time and distance meters for D.C. taxis must be installed no later than April 1, 2008. The announcement came about nine hours after the end of a 24-hour taxicab driver strike in response to the Mayor's decision to abandon the zone system. Fenty and D.C. Taxicab Commission Chairman Leon Swain Jr. also announced the pricing structure for the new meters: a $4 flag drop charge, then...

Happy Halloween, Washington! From the looks of things, Mayor Adrian Fenty is in a festive mood for the holiday, and had a great time right alongside everyone else at last night's 17th Street High Heel Race. The Examiner isn't so sure Fenty's high spirits will last though, as members of the D.C. Council are ticked off at the Mayor for snubbing their hearings by not sending a representative from his office to attend them. Hopefully...

There seems to be some healthy skepticism about the planned taxicab driver strike on Wednesday, which is set to commence at 6 a.m. on Halloween morning and last for 24 hours. How many drivers will really strike? Could it actually change Mayor Adrian Fenty's mind about switching to time and distance meters? Is the fact that it's planned for Halloween going to impact the number of drunk drivers out on the road? If D.C. taxi...

Mayor Adrian Fenty has ordered all D.C. taxicabs to switch to time and distance meters, abandoning forever the controversial zone system that has been unique to Washington for decades. “As we work to become a world-class city, it is essential that all aspects of District government are user friendly, fair and efficient for residents and visitors alike,” Fenty said in a statement released to the media. “District residents are overwhelmingly in favor of modernizing...

Imagine this -- the District could have hybrid taxicabs before it even resolves its long-running dispute between meters and the zone system. Councilmember Tommy Wells (D-Ward 6) yesterday introduced legislation that would offer a one-time tax credit to encourage the purchase of hybrid or alternative fuel vehicles for use as taxicabs. The legislation would also establish a set of goals for converting the city's taxicab fleet to hybrid vehicles -- 5 percent by 2009 and...

Well, this isn't exactly what we were expecting. Rather than voting to endorse a change to meters, or keeping the existing zone system, or the third-option of those "zone meters" we talked about yesterday, the D.C. Taxicab Commission today decided to do ... absolutely nothing. The Post has more, describing today's meeting as being deadlocked, which led to the non-decision to recommend that Mayor Fenty make the call all on his own.

Mayor Fenty has until October 31 to issue an executive order about whether the city will make a switch away from the much-maligned yet beloved-by-many zone system in our taxis, but tomorrow, the D.C. Taxicab Commission will meet to vote on their recommendation to the Mayor. Everyone knows that the zone system is unpopular, especially with visitors to the city who often end up angry and confused about how much they should be charged for...

We've spent plenty of time debating whether or not the District's taxicabs should stick to the zone system or join the rest of the modern world and employ meters. Last year, Congress passed legislation giving the District until this October to switch to meters, and more recently, the D.C. Taxicab Commission released a study that found that on average, meters were cheaper. Of course, cab drivers have long opposed the prospect of a switch, and...

>> "A public meeting on taxicab meters scheduled for Wednesday has been canceled, apparently because too many people were interested in attending and the D.C. Taxicab Commission couldn't guarantee them parking." [Examiner] >> A former escort linked to embattled Sen. David Vitter is set to testify that alleged D.C. Madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey's escort service provided illegal prostitution. [WTOP] >> Libertarian billionaire Robert Levy would like to give all D.C. residents a handgun. Or...

An alert tipster sent us a link to a District of Columbia Taxicab Commission release we missed. The results of the Taxicab Information Project, launched in October 2005 to study fare differences between D.C. taxis outfitted with meters against standard zone charges, were made public on June 19. Time and distance meters were installed in 21 D.C. cabs. At the beginning of each trip, drivers were instructed to drop the meter flag and record...

The Examiner reports today that the D.C. Taxicab Commission released its new zone-fare map to District cab drivers to place in their vehicles this week. Which seems odd, since the maps have been ready since February, and have been spotted in various cabs in the city since then (though by no means all of them). The new maps, part of Mayor Adrian Fenty’s 100 Day plan, were designed to be less confusing than the...

Two long years ago, gas prices in the city were hovering around an eye-popping $2.59 for a gallon of regular. That may seem like chump change these days, but back then, it had a lot of people worried. At the top of that list were D.C. cabbies. Worried that the rising cost of gas would cut into their profits, the D.C. Taxicab Commission responded to the price spike by implementing a $1.00 per ride surcharge to offset additional fuel costs. When the extra fee expired in January of 2006, the Commission decided to roll out a somewhat haphazard set of fare increases across the board, ranging from $1.00 to $1.70 depending on distance.

Who needs government when we have Google?

Even from the time before a hack named Samson trawled Washington's streets, searching for fares and pityin' fools galore, D.C. residents have had issues with the city's taxicab service, from ride refusal to incivil drivers. This week, the D.C. Taxicab Commission began hosting a series of community fora in each Ward of the city for residents to raise questions and voice concerns over a host of cab-related issues. Of course, if DCist's comment boards are...

And it was just beginning to look like the hopes and dreams of District bloggers and commenters everywhere were going to come true. Yesterday, the Examiner reported that the D.C. Taxicab Commission would release a report in the next few weeks expected to support ditching D.C.'s zone system in favor of regular old meters. The six-month study was conducted by George Washington University and pulls data from over 30,000 cab rides, comparing metered and zoned fares along similar routes.

As a Brookland resident, one comes to realize that cabbing home from District night spots brings its own set of difficulties. Despite living just blocks from major D.C. landmarks and minutes from downtown, neighborhood residents learn that when hailing a cab, they're going to have to get in the car before telling the driver the destination, they're going to have to give him detailed directions on how to get there, and they're going to have to reassure the driver several times that it's not much further. Brooklanders (myself included) are sometimes boggled by the cabbie response -- this is Northeast, after all, not the wilds of Outer Suburbia -- but I have come to accept it as part of living on the other side of North Capitol Street.

After a long night out, sometimes the biggest relief is a quick cab ride home -- no waiting 17 minutes for the Green Line train, no running after a bunch of 30's buses as they pull away from your stop. That relief is soon to be a little more expensive.

On the day following the D.C. Council's second and final endorsement of a smoking ban in bars and restaurants, we can expect plenty of media coverage of the public's reaction. Are residents pleased to be smoke-free, or nervous at what consequences may lay ahead for the hospitality industry? According to a WJLA headline, which really scooped the competition, "Patrons Have Mixed Opinions On D.C. Smoking Ban." Hell, we could have told you that. Just read the newly-anarchic comments on any of our smoking ban posts.

Does Vienna Really Look Like That?