Taxi Driver Online

This is the press rehash of the email I posted in the 'Licensing and legal' section.

Not sure if this was actually what was issued by the Royal & Ancient, or if this was the council's email, or if the council's email just parroted what the R&A told them.

But it's obviously not up to the R&A to abandon the zoning system and let all HCs in Fife ply for hire in the East zone. And I'm not sure how the council went about doing that either, at least as far as the procedures and legalities are concerned, as opposed to the Facebook post and emails sent out


150th Open: SoS to all Fife taxi drivers to help huge crowds at St Andrews

https://www.fifetoday.co.uk/news/people ... ws-3771609

An eleventh hour SOS was issued to all Fife taxi drivers yesterday to help cope with demand in St Andrews as the 150th Open came to a conclusion.

Disruption to public transport meant golf fans faced a real challenge getting to and from the landmark championships as tens of thousands swarmed to the Old Course.

Late on Sunday afternoon, the R&A issued a request for help to all taxi drivers to help.

It made a specific request for all hires to head to St Andrews to help tackle the “unprecedented demand” for taxi and private hire services in St Andrews.

Cabbies from across the region were given permission to access the local taxi ranks in the Petheram Bridge car park and The Scores after emails were sent to all.

The messages from the R&A said: “Due to the popularity of the 150th Open Golf Championship this year, combined with disruption to the public transport system, we have seen unprecedented demand for taxi and private hire services in St Andrews.

“As a result, The Royal & Ancient, as event organisers, have made a specific request for taxis from other areas in Fife to come to St Andrews to help with the demand, and, as a result all yellow-plate Fife taxis will be permitted access to the ranks in the Petheram Bridge (Yellow J) car park and The Scores.”

The two ranks in question are temporary ranks, and traffic access has been restricted and controlled by stewards. But as far as I'm aware one is on the public highway, and the other is in a council car park, and access is restricted via temporary traffic orders, or whatever the normal procedures are for that kind of thing.

So I'm assuming the ranks aren't on private land, which would have allowed out-of-area cars to ply for hire.

So essentially the council has let HCs from other areas ply for hire in a public place, as far as I can see. All very murky as regards the legals and all that, if you ask me at least

When it suits the powers that be, normal rules often go out of the window.

A proper licensing authority, and a proper firm organising the tournament, would engage with the taxi firms/drivers 6 months in advance.

Not one hour before the end.

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IDFIMH

Well presumably this has all been forgotten about already (until 2027, or whenever the Open returns to St Andrews), but drafted this on Monday, so will bore the forum with some of the details about the town's ranks.

Anyway, one of the temporary ranks to which the out-of-zone taxis were to be given access is right beside the main road, and at the busier times I can't imagine people standing there for any length of time. They'd try to hail a cab on the adjacent main road. That is the main road coming into St Andrews, and the rank was in the car park to the right. Of course, it was a lot busier during the Open, and the Old Course is just behind these buildings in the centre of the screen below, so it's all quite close to the course.

But a driver said the other night that the reason for the 'dezoning' on the Sunday was because some people had waited 2.5 hours at a rank

Of course, that's excessive, but I just can't imagine that was because of a lack of cars as such, but maybe the rank was 'forgotten' about, effectively.

And, of course, unlike the normal scenario in St Andrews, where it's relatively unusual to see any people queuing at ranks, it was a whole lot different last week, and as drivers in the bigger cities might be aware, when there's lots of people hailing then the ranks are often the worst place for punters to queue, because the taxis tend to be hired before they get to the ranks. Therefore...

So lots of people hailing around the area in the image up to the buildings in the centre then further up towards the town centre. So can't really imagine anyone waiting at the rank in the car park to the right, but if they were, then hardly a surprise they were kind of forgotten about...

https://www.google.com/maps/@56.3420348 ... 8192?hl=en

Although perhaps the more likely rank for excessive waiting was the rank off the main drag, which was right beside the Old Course, which is immediately to the left in the image. That's the R&A clubhouse to the left, and the back of the rank was where that dark coloured van is parked to the right.

Which was a great location for both passengers and drivers in the afternoon and early evening (assuming you could actually get on the rank), but again I suspect that rank would be likely to be forgotten about later in the evening. That's because it's off the main drag a bit, and by mid- to late- evening the main action has migrated into the town itself

More importantly, the rank was in the middle of a temporary one-way system, so if any driver was to think about passing by the rank, and there was nobody there, they'd literally be in a loop of around a mile (in a 20mph zone) until they had a chance of a flag or getting back to another rank. Therefore it was a one-way trap, thus drivers would tend to avoid it if there's easier pickings elsewhere

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Five+ ... 6984?hl=en

Another possibility for waiting is the main day rank at the bus station, which is mainly office cars waiting for jobs, and generally only one or two cars will rank there in the evening, and possibly none at all later on.

But a bit busier during the Open, and it's not that far from the epicentre of the golf. However, you can see the front taxi on the rank in the centre of the image below, and that's from the main drag just on the edge of the town centre, so can't really imagine anyone standing there for long in the evening when there will self-evidently be taxis passing by on the main road where the Google car is imaging from, and anyone hailing a cab will very likely be standing up there.

And another more general point. As an independent, I'd really only go to the bus station rank if there were no cars there. At least that was what I did twenty years ago. So I'd maybe have a look from where the Google car is, then maybe call in if there were zero or few cars ranking or, shock horror, a punter waiting.

However, c. 2000 the council 'remodelled' the bus station to accommodate all the extra buses the Scottish Government was paying for. They tried to get rid of the taxi rank altogether, but after the trade protested they shoehorned in a replacement rank. Which had all kinds of 'issues'. But, and more to the present point, instead of just driving in off the main road you can't actually join the rank from that end (note the no entry sign), and now you have to take a detour of up to one mile or so , negotiating three roundabouts, two or three pedestrian crossings, various humps, bumps and potholes etc

By which time, of course, the rank itself might end up full of cars. And of course, some of them may have actually been behind you, but cheated and ignored the no entry sign

End result - now I simply don't bother with the bus station rank

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Five+ ... 6984?hl=en

But that just demonstrates how the whole 'rank dynamic' thing can work, which I suspect neither the council nor the R&A have much of a clue about

In that context it's also worth mentioning the town's main night rank. Which is plagued with illegal parkers at the best of times, but during the Open it was basically inaccessible for hours every night because of parked cars, and I actively avoided it for that reason. And, at times going up that street queuing punters would jump out in front of you from behind parked cars. (And, of course, anyone with any sense would stand elsewhere and flag down a car before it even got near that rank, leaving the people actually at the rank stranded.)

At the last Open in 2015 I spoke to a street pastor (who don't normally operate in town, but had rolled up for the Open), who said that he'd had to break up numerous fights on the Friday night because that rank was full of parked cars, and when a taxi did join the rank they'd maybe only be able to pull in 50 yards from the front of the queue, and there would be a mad rush of people towards the taxi. Therefore...

The pastor said he 'couldn't believe' the attitude of police when he asked them if they could do anything about the illegal parkers. They just shrugged their shoulders, effectively

Anyway, that's just a few thoughts on it all. And, although it's just one day a year on average, much of it is relevant to the more normal stuff about rank management in the town. As per usual, don't get me started

But just to add that when I was near a rank with an obvious queue of people (mainly the town's other usual night rank) then I'd pick up from the rank rather than stopping for the flaggers standing 50 yards away

Also, as I said on Monday, it was a bit late in the day for the dezoning to do anything to address any problems anyway. At about 6pm on Sunday there was an excess of cars on one of the ranks that the other Fife cars had been invited onto. And that was before any of the drivers in the other zone would have had any real chance to get through to St Andrews to fight their way through the thronging masses after the SoS email went out about 4pm.

It was certainly busy from close of play at around 7pm to maybe 9pm, when there were a couple of cars ranking in town. By 10pm I got a good run down to Anstruther, and as I live between there and St Andrews decided not to bother going back to town. So don't really know what happened later at night, but from past experience very much doubt it would have been anything like the Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

Only ever been to St Andrews once.

Quite liked the place, but didn't get the love for that bridge on the golf course.

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IDFIMH

The 2023 open is at Royal Liverpool , not far from us. It’s about £40 in a cab. Quite a lot of people stay in Chester, especially the yanks, as it’s quite easy to get to by train as well. I don’t mind taking people there but I don’t bother with the returns, I’m usually home by then anyway, unless it’s Saturday. Hopefully we should be quite busy this weekend with Chris Evan’s Carfest on at Bolesworth castle. It’s an easy £20 fare, but again l, picking up can be a nightmare so I don’t bother.

To be fair, there was some liaison and dialogue, but as usual I avoided it all. I'd either say nothing, or say far too much, and it would all be the wrong stuff as far as officialdom is concerned, and it might all blow up in my face. The usual 'discretion is the better part of valour', kind of thing

And they did send us detailed maps and guidance about how to access and use the temporary ranks, although I was only at one of them a handful of times, and avoided the other two completely (one was on private land, and required a permit, which I didn't apply for), so not really sure how well they worked in practice.

But apparently opening up St Andrews to the other zones was discussed prior to the event, but presumably discounted as unfeasible. Apparently the R&A were worried that there wouldn't be enough taxis to cope. Not sure they were aware of the fact that there's fewer taxis working the town than pre-lockdown, but think they were expecting bigger crowds than previously, and there's always problems getting taxis during the Open, and that's not really the norm here, for public hirings at least.

Another big factor was the industrial action on the railways, as discussed in another thread. So there were to be no late evening trains leaving the nearest station at Leuchars. And there's normally extra trains specifically for golf fans, and through ticketing for a GolfLink service, which uses a fleet of double decker buses to shuttle fans from the trains to the Open itself.

But which didn't happen this year because of the rail situation, so no special trains, an no late trains at all. So the R&A advised golf fans not to use the trains at all, which is the reverse of their normal advice, which is to come by train if possible, and leave the car at home.

So I think they installed extra park and ride sites instead, so that the extra people coming by car wouldn't clog up the roads close to St Andrews. Not sure how that would impact on the taxis, but I was assuming it wouldn't be good for us, because more people would be arriving by car rather than public transport, and we normally get a good bit of fallout from the latter, particularly when things go pear-shaped in terms of late trains/buses, cancellations and overcrowding, which is obviously a thing for taxis everywhere, and at any time.

Anyway, not sure how all that came together and what the impact was, but I'd guess things maybe were a bit busier than during previous Opens, although I don't think I made as much, because I was going home maybe midnight/2am latest, rather than waiting until the worst of the drunks fell out of the pubs at 3am. (And I was doing a couple of runs in the mornings as well, most days.)

But obviously some did have to wait a long time for a taxi, particularly on the Friday and Saturday, but as per what I said earlier, suspect they were just waiting in the wrong place rather than how long they waited being typical of passengers as a whole.

And, again, I suspect the SoS invitation late on Sunday afternoon was literally too late in the day, and maybe the R&A panicked a bit after the Saturday, maybe unaware that the last day of the tournament on the Sunday isn't as busy as the previous couple of days, at least after the mid-evening hour or two immediately after the Open finishes.

I'd guess it made little difference, if any. On the other hand, if things had been opened up for the whole tournament, I don't think things would have gone well.

I mean, there's 150 HCs in our zone, but there's another 330 or so in the other Fife zones. Of course, not all would have come to St Andrews for the Open, but it doesn't take much imagination to see what would have happened if they had been allowed through for the whole week

Might have been fine for a few hours on Friday and Saturday, but before and after the ranks could barely cope with the number of cars as it was, so not sure where they could have put even an extra few dozen, never mind 100+, or whatever.

And, of course, whatever the theory, the cars from the other zones would have been working the town itself after the mid-evening period, after which the temporary ranks died a death.

And because the town's main night rank was full of parked cars for most of the week, there were really only *four* official rank spaces kept clear. Which to an extent wasn't an issue because people were hailing from the streets, but if there had been dozens of extra cars then the street hails would have been cleared a lot more quickly, and the ranks clogging up more quickly as a consequence.

Anyway, don't know how many cars actually made it through from the other zones, but because our East zone is huge, and cars appear from here, there and everywhere for the Open, there was always going to be cars that I didn't recognize anyway. And you have to be very close to see the zone letter on the plate, which is really the only obvious indication, unless it's a firm with a logo and signage etc.

But I did see one car about 8.30pm, which I think was from the Levenmouth zone. Wasn't even aware of the dezoning at that point, and he was driving very slowly and hesitantly, and I assume he was in town for a pre-booking. So I was behind him approaching the South Street rank, where there were people waiting, and swung round at the usual point. But seems he was intending to swing round as well, but went a bit further up the road, and I ended up in front of him. And I got a £30 run, and pretty sure he got a local

Anyway, I was home and hosed by about 11pm that night, so not sure if many other Fife cars appeared, but the other drivers I spoke to afterwards didn't seem to think so, and some of them seemed totally unaware of what had happened.

So I'd guess it didn't make a whole lot of difference on the Sunday, and the night probably fizzled out fairly quickly, at least compared to the previous nights.

But it will be interesting to see if it all has any impact next time round, but my intention is not to be there. But I said that after the 2000 Open. And the 2005 Open, and the 2010 Open, and 2015 And I might be dead by then anyway

Anyway, once I have a few spare minutes I might go into some depth about what happened in St Andrews during Open 2022

Only joking - think that's more than enough for now

So you earnt more money than previous Opens, yet worked fewer unsociable hours.

I regard that as a successful week.

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IDFIMH

Meant to reply, I actually made less than in previous Opens, I think, but my point was that because I didn't work so late (and maybe not coming out so early either) and probably fewer hours overall, then not easy just looking at the figures to work out whether or not it was actually busier for me

And my hours are never particularly regular at any time, so it's always difficult for me comparing from year to year etc. And can't be bothered looking back at the fare levels in 2015, although they were a bit lower, although not massively so - in the last few years they've only really tinkered with the fares - about 15p a run 'hike' about three years ago, wasn't it?


And, to be honest, I deliberately avoided trying to compare the daily totals and the final totals from last time round, because that's often the kind of thing I get unnecessarily stressed out about. You've got a target in mind, and when things aren't going well getting to that target, it just causes unnecessary stress

But all things considered, and without getting into the fine details, I'd say it was a tad busier overall, but I personally made less, for the reasons outlined

When I first started I use to get a bit stressed if I had a bad start to the night. To deal with it I stopped checking the meter and counting the cash until the end of the night, and more times than not my bad start balanced out over the shift.

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IDFIMH

I noticed that video has had all of 2 views and I was one of them which shows how interested the folks on here are

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Yes, you're right Edders - removed the post since the only people likely to be remotely interested are maybe those who might take offence