No Ticket Needed To Ride The Tuk Tuk
2nd October 2008
The Totnes tuk tuk operation is running a free taxi service to get around a byelaw ban which is threatening to run the three wheeled rickshaws off the road.
For the last two weekends the Totnes Rickshaw Company has been running free rides from Steamer Quay to the Rotherfold almost a mile away at the top end of the town's steep main street.
It has become so popular that people were queuing up for the Rickshaw trips last Saturday – even though there is no official 'bus stop' and the trips are not being advertised.
The company cannot charge for the rides because a recent South Hams Council licensing panel decision rejected an application for a taxi licence – claiming the 416cc machine did not conform to council by-laws or the 161-year-old Hackney Carriage laws.
The company is pressing South Hams Council to look at altering its byelaws to allow the rickshaws on the road.
Meanwhile it has launched the free operation – to help encourage the thousands of people who pour into the town by coach and boat to make the trip to the top of the town.
Rickshaw company chairman Pete Ryeland said: "We have decided to offer a skeleton service to show our commitment to Totnes and to keep it in the public eye.
"We believe that because we are running the service free of charge that it is no different to any one offering someone a lift up the hill.
"We have had a lot support from people who cannot believe that the rickshaws have not been supported by the council. People think the rickshaws are a good idea," he said.
Company director Dave Lacey hit out at the antiquated byelaws and pointed to Purbeck council in Dorset that had granted licenses for motorised tuk tuks at Swanage seafront.
He said: " South Hams District Council are themselves looking at ways to link the tourism trade from Steamer Quay to the rest of the town – well, here was the opportunity to do that in partnership.
"We have massive support from a wide range of people in Totnes and we are determined to provide a service"
Mr Ryeland added: "Our rickshaws which are converted to run on recycled cooking oil will be the greenest motorised transport on the roads in Devon. We are sustainable, green and we now know that a precedent in Purbeck exists to the granting of a hackney licence to a motorised rickshaw."
Mr Ryeland has asked for talks with the licensing panel to try to hammer out a way around the tuk tuk problems – but has been told that is impossible.
A council spokesman explained that the licensing panel would only be formed to deal with a further application if the rickshaw company wants to submit one.
Any pre-application talks would have to take place with the council's licensing officer Graham Munson and not the panel of councillors who turned the original application down.
She also said that operating a free tuk tuk service from Steamer Quay was legal as long as the operation was not linked to a specific business in a way that encouraged or expected passengers to patronise that business.
Meanwhile Totnes councillor Anne Ward - one of the district councillors who protested over the licensing decision when South Hams Council met last week – pointed out that it was within the council's power to alter its own byelaws.
But she warned that it was a long process that involved public consultation and the ultimate go ahead from the Home Office – a process that would take at least six months.
"What we wanted was to have the rickshaws in operation for Christmas. This delay is very frustrating," she said.
And while councillors were told how the byelaw process works there was no decision taken to make – or even consider – any alterations.
Mr Ryeland, who has so far decided not to appeal against the licensing panel decision taken at the end of August, said: "I'd rather work with the council to find out what we can do rather than fight them with a second application."
Source; thisissouthdevon.co.uk
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