Taxi Driver Online

Crazy that the London cab trade are going out of their way to kill off all their trade.

Still at least the good people of London now have a choice of licensed vehicle.

And thank the lord most of them are seeing the light and coming our way.

Ollie

Talking about your mob, if you were anywhere near Charing Cross Road last night, you would have seen the wonderful sight of two licensed Minicabs sitting on a couple of tow trucks after the TFL Met unit arrested their drivers for touting near Taliban Taxees old office.

Apparantly they are now applying to the courts to have their ' Licensed Minicabs ' crushed upon conviction.

The Author of this report has been asked to clarify the distinction between LTI type vehicles and saloon type vehicles. The reason being is that in this particular instance the use of the Generic word "Taxi" is highly inappropriate.

The following is the press release taken from Imperial College website with the make of the offending vehicle added by myself. In future, it would be less misleading and more desirable if these researches would clarify their subject matter more accurately.

Now we know that LTI are the top pollutants I wonder if and how they will defend their position? I also wonder what "Leicester council" and "Allied" will make of this when they read it?

So, let me try to fathom out what youhave done here.

You take a report, do not like how it reads, and then fraudulently re-write it to suit your needs. Is that legal?

Question one.when you questionably claim these vehicles are the most polluting, do you mean equally all TX11, TX1 Fairways, and FX4 cabs, and if so why?

Question two. Is something not being done (in London) to combat this?
...............................................................................................

Taking an LTI London Black taxi could increase your exposure to pollution.

For immediate release

Tuesday 10 January 2006

Researchers have discovered that your level of exposure to pollution can vary according to what method of transport you use, with travelling by LTI London type taxis resulting in the highest levels of exposure and walking one of the least.

Research published in the journal Atmospheric Environment, describes how the team from Imperial College London and the Health and Safety Laboratory, Buxton, measured and visualised exposure to pollution levels, while using a variety of different transport methods for travelling across London.

The researchers looked at five modes of transport, including walking, cycling, car, London taxi and bus, and measured levels of exposure to ultrafine particles when travelling on them using a newly developed system that uses in combination an ultrafine particle counter and video recorder.

Walking to work may result in least exposure to pollution

Ultrafine particles are less than 100 nanometres in diameter and mainly traffic related. Their small size and large surface area means it is possible to inhale large quantities which makes them particularly dangerous.

The visualisation system allows video images of individuals activities to be played back alongside the ultrafine particle concentrations they are exposed to. As a result, most activities and behaviours that cause high exposures can be visibly identified, such as being trapped on traffic islands and waiting in congested traffic.

On average, while travelling in a LTI London taxi, passengers were exposed to over 100,000 ultrafine particles counts per cubic centimetre (pt/cm3), travelling in a bus resulted in exposure to just under 100,000 pt/cm3, travelling in car caused exposure to 40,000 pt/cm3, cycling was around 80,000 pt/cm3, and walking was just under 50,000 pt/cm3.

Surbjit Kaur from Imperial College London, and first author of the paper, said: "It was a real surprise to find the extent to which walking resulted in such a low exposure. The higher exposure from travelling in taxis may come from actually sitting in the vehicle while being stuck in traffic where you are directly in the path of the pollutant source. Also the fact that taxis are probably on the road for much longer than your average car could cause an accumulation of ultra fine particles."

Dr Mark Nieuwenhuijsen from Imperial College London, added: "The particular strength of the system is the visual aspect. The new monitoring and visualisation system is an effective environmental risk communication tool that can be used to identify, visualise and avoid hotspots of pollution."

The study was carried out as part of the DAPPLE (Dispersion of Air Pollution & Penetration into the Local Environment) project, which looks to provide a better understanding of the physical processes affecting street and neighbourhood scale flows of air, traffic and people, and their corresponding interactions with the dispersion of pollutants. The project consortium includes the University of Bristol, the University of Cambridge, Imperial College London, University of Leeds, University of Reading and the University of Surrey.

DAPPLE is funded by the Engineering and Physical Science Research Council. Further information about the project and exposure visualisation samples can be seen at www.dapple.org.uk

Iffy,messing with someone else's report, is it not?

Only if you don't mention the changes you have made, or if your intension is to mislead? The author of this report should have been specific and mentioned the vehicle or vehicles they tested, instead of using the catch all generic term, of "Taxis".

I suppose LTI will have a valid reason for being the top polluter in London.

Perhaps the pco should bring in more stringent safety conditions such as the ABS breaking system, and emisions that meet the highest standards of those saloon cars, which were highlighted in this recent research?

JD

I thought the PCO were bringing in stricter emmission controls.

Does the TX 1/11 share an identical Ford engine as the transit van, which must thereforebe equally "polluting?"

It is obvious that this "report" is poorly researched. Blaming "Taxi's", then with a bit of unjudicious editing from a contributor, LTI. Theoretically, this could cover many vehicles, with different drive trains. For instance, FX4's with BMC engines, Fairways with Nissan engines, and TX 1/11, with Ford engines. It does not strike you as odd, that only LTI vehicles, and not Metrocabs, or Transit vans, with identical engines, are equally polluting? You would appear to be clutching at straws, publishing any bad press that LTI get, whether it is justified or not. If the publishers of this research did not qualify the term "TAXI", why do you take it upon yourself to claim they were talking about a whole product range going back over several years, and no other identically engined vehicles?

A (not very well) hidden agenda perhaps?

But no answer as to why only LTI vehicles were targeted? No answer why a TX11 is polluting but a Transit is not, when they are sharing an identical engine?

Cabs in London are surely the best maintained vehicles on the road, subject to constant checks, including emmissions.

THis distorted report is complete wazz, as you well know, but, as usual you do not allow the truth to get in the way of what you view as a good story.

But no answer as to why only LTI vehicles were targeted? No answer why a TX11 is polluting but a Transit is not, when they are sharing an identical engine? Cabs in London are surely the best maintained vehicles on the road, subject to constant checks, including emmissions. THis distorted report is complete wazz, as you well know, but, as usual you do not allow the truth to get in the way of what you view as a good story.