'No more new taxis,' says Cardiff Council
Cardiff Council decided to limit the number of taxis in the city following a survey which showed an excess supply for the demand
Posted by Hannah Waldram Tuesday 30 March 2010 14.06 BST
guardian.co.uk
No new licences for taxis in Cardiff will be granted after the council today decided to cap the number of taxis in the city.
The decision is welcomed by black and white taxi drivers, who have held a year-long campaign to stop new licences being granted by Cardiff Council. Read the background and my report from the last meeting
Read the background and my report from the last meeting here.
A temporary moratorium was put on new applications for taxi licences earlier this month. The public protection committee was waiting for the completion of a survey conducted this year to find out if numbers of independent taxis and Hackney carriages in the city exceeded the demand. Following the results of the survey, the committee was satisfied a limit on the number of taxis in Cardiff was needed.
Government guidance advises city councils to veer away from limiting the number of taxis in cities – and Cardiff will be in the minority going against the recommendation for delimitation. But the survey found 875 hackney carriages more than catered for a population the size of Cardiff.
Councillor Asghar Ali said: "We have got more than enough supply of taxis in the city and we have seen what was said at the last meeting. The number of taxis with licences has more than doubled in the last five years."
The council must now hold a separate hearing for 10 taxi drivers who applied for licences in the interim period between the moratorium and the decision to limit the number of new licences.
Mathab Khan, chairman of the hackney carriage association who first applied to the council to review their delimitation policy, said:
"This should've happened about two years ago. It's late, but it's better than never. It will take 15 years for the number of taxis to represent the population according to data in the survey, so I hope it's a long time before the council decide to take the cap off."
Philip Boots, an independent taxi driver who has worked in Cardiff for the last 30 years, said: "Taxi licences were being given out freely, but now they have rubber stamped the decision from the last meeting, but we don't know how long they will block new licences.
"It's removed a lot of uncertainty for independent drivers, and means we'll go back to making a better living."
The survey
The study looked at taxi ranks and public attitudes towards the numbers of taxis. Results showed there was always an excess supply of taxis at ranks to meet the demand – particularly around Cardiff Central station. The study recommended the number of hackney carriage licences be capped.
You can read the study in full here.
There has been a huge increase in the number of hackney carriage licences in the city from 480 in 2002. Now there are currently 875 hackney carriages operating in the city, alongside 865 private hire licensed vehicles. The population of Cardiff was last reported at 305,000 people (2001 census), which equates to one hackney carriage per 359 people. Bigger cities like Birmingham have one hackney carriage per 726 people – which means there are a lot more carriages in Cardiff than there needs to be.
The study also found taxis on Saunders Road outside Cardiff Central Station often had to wait 48 minutes at weekends to pick up a new passenger.
The survey also questioned 1,000 members of the public in February 2010. Some respondents said they had to wait two hours at a taxi rank – but the majority caught taxis straight away. In general, people were satisfied with taxi services in the city, and were unaware there was a problem with surplus numbers of taxis in the city
source;
http://www.guardian.co.uk/cardiff/2010/ ... ssociation
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