Taxi Driver Online

Southampton Central taxi rank change could lead to strike

https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/240743 ... ad-strike/


Ajmal Sudhan, 55, pointing at the pavement kerbs

Taxi drivers in Southampton are threatening to revolt over the 'thoughtless' redesign of a rank outside the city's biggest railway station.

A £5.5m redesign of Southampton Central interchange has been blasted by angry cabbies, who say the revamped rank on the southern forecourt is not wheelchair accessible.

They say the narrow design also means taxis sometimes have to drive across the pavement to leave - but the council claims it consulted drivers ahead of the changes.

In an email to the chairman of the city council's licensing committee, the Southampton Hackney Organisation called for an urgent meeting with key decision makers - and said it was 'putting in plans for multiple strikes against the council regarding this matter'.

These would start from February and run straight up to May's local election.

"It is a mess that has been created by Southampton City Council, which the council needs to fix," the email said.

Because the kerb for the new rank does not drop, wheelchair-bound passengers often struggle to get into the back of disabled-friendly taxis.

Chairman of the association, Ajmal Sudhan, said he has had disabled passengers rant about how they struggle to get into the back of taxis without a dropped kerb.

The 55-year-old said: “The passengers were very frustrated. I had one lady who couldn’t even get out of her wheelchair, and she couldn’t get into the car.”

Because of the narrow design of the rank, the only taxis which can easily leave are at the front of the queue, or at the end - because they can reverse out.

So if someone needs a wheelchair-friendly taxi and it is not in these positions, they often have to drive on the pavement to get out of the queue.

The council claims this issue is being managed by taxi drivers - but Ajmal disagrees.

He said: “The way that they designed this makes it look like they weren’t thinking.

“What the council have said to us is that cars behind it can just reverse to let the van out.

"But tell me how when it’s so busy here in the station, how are you going to get three taxis out of the rank while cars and passengers are at the station?

The driver of 30 years added: “The old rank was preferred because we had a lot more space. The new one they have come up with just makes things worse for us.”

The former chairman of the association, Sam Shahiedi, 69, met with the local authority to discuss the plans in 2021 - but claimed they 'changed the plans but didn’t check with us that it was okay with us'.

In response, Southampton City Council said: “The improved forecourt layout on the south side of Central Station has been designed to take into account the needs of all rail users and transport operators.

"Two dedicated areas for taxis have been provided, including a rank on the forecourt and a waiting area on Western Esplanade.

"The detailed designs were shared with representatives of the taxi trade, with the opportunity to pose any questions or concerns they had. The taxi rank was designed within the space available and the width is comparable to taxi ranks at other similar stations.

"The forecourt has only recently been re-opened and we are continuing to monitor its usage at this early stage. When a taxi with wheelchair access is located in the middle of the taxi rank, this is being managed by the taxi drivers.

"Wheelchair users also have the option to book a taxi to collect them from the disabled bay in the southern forecourt or use the northern side of the station where there is more space available for the wheelchair-accessible taxis.”

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IDFIMH

I can see their point often the fares from there are to cruise ships and sometimes the front taxi can take ages to get all the luggage in whilst the ones behind are loaded more quickly.

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

As well as the WAV issue and Edders' point above, the design means that cars can't get out to do a pre-booked job - by the looks of the other photo it's not as if circuit cars aren't allowed to use the rank, or whatever.

And even if cars doing only public hire were allowed on the rank, what if they've finished their shift and/or need to go home? Or have waited a couple of hours and get fed up? If our rank at the station was designed like that you could easily want to get out of the queue at the end of your shift, or whatever, and have to wait a few hours until the cars in front move off

Or what about longer jobs and the cars in front won't/can't do it?

So, in reality, the cars will end up having to drive over the pavement


Looks like there's actually plenty space available, but of course the people who design these things seem to prefer to maximise space for pedestrians (and cyclists), and making things more difficult for drivers.

As for the rank width being comparable with other stations, perhaps they're missing the point here. It's not the width of the rank per se that's the problem, it's exiting the rank from behind the first car that the issue

So either the council being disingenuous here, or they're missing the point spectacularly. I'd guess it's probably the latter, and that would also explain why such a design was rubber-stamped in the first place.

I didn't quite get the point being made at first either (from the first photo, there could be an access and exit area on the nearside - not typical, but not unknown either) but it's totally obvious from the other photo what the problem is:

For what it's worth, high-res versions of the photos below, which show the fairly nasty-looking kerb

And, for example, why is the taxi rank sign not up at the front car?

If there were no cars, could just about see some people starting to queue up at the front, with some queuing back at the sign...not difficult to work out how the likes of that could result in a kick off of some kind

I mean, it's difficult enough sometimes to get punters to queue properly at a rank without actually enabling confusion and conflict...

https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/resources/images/17682328

https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/resources/images/17682316.

https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/resources/images/17682310

Missed that last night - so if the second car gets a WAV job/needs to go for a pre-booked run/has finished his shift/doesn't want to wait any longer and decides to try another rank/wants to do a longer run that the other cars won't do, then all the cars behind have to reverse out of the other end of the rank

How many cars can actually queue in the rank? Do the council even know? And imagine the bickering between drivers all of that would cause? In reality, it's a case of driving over that nasty kerb and over the pavement.

And, of course, one dimension to a lot of stuff like this is that it makes the trade look bad (driving onto and over the pavement, in particular), when in reality it's the council who have created the problem

A couple of other scenarios I was thinking about - what if a car breaks down, or, horrors of horrors - has a flat battery? Jump starting a car on the rank can cause enough chaos at the best of times, but...

Or what if some daftie member of the public comes along and parks on the rank? Even the council here in Fife have done that on occasion at our station rank, without any obvious need to do so. Of course, you'd think no one would be daft enough to park on the likes of the type of rank in the photos above, but, you know...

Almost 100 comments on the Echo's website, but most of them go off at a bit of a tangent - you know, fake blue badge holders, mobility scooters, taxi fares, council mismanagement and incompetence generally

But the first comment demonstrates how people can miss the point of it all spectacularly, even while viewing all the photos - nothing to suggest that the *punters* wouldn't normally access the cars from the passenger side - it's what's happening on the driver's side that's the issue for the trade:



This one is a bit more astute and to the point - presumably this is someone in the trade. But succinctly sums up a lot of this kind of stuff:


Another possible solution is maybe that if a car wants out mid-rank then they could all drive off and come back round again

But, of course, stuff like that would be difficult enough to organise and do orderly, even on a rank like ours at Leuchars, which is relatively uncongested, with with plenty of space.

But at the likes of Southampton, and with the rearrangement of external traffic management as described in the comment

I don't know how much consultation with the trade there has been on this matter.

Maybe at the beginning with a few drawings and a few promises. But on matters as important to the trade, as a station taxi rank, the local trade should have been on this from the time the first paving stone was laid to completion.

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IDFIMH

Yes, even if the trade hadn't been given a detailed heads up at the formal consultation stage, you'd have thought that the drivers would have realised at some point in the process how it was all going to end.

But you know how these things can work - the council only liaise with a few trade reps, who aren't there when the paving etc is being finalised. And most drivers leave it to others. And when the work was being done and the trade realised what was happening, they contacted the council, and the relevant person was on a sickie, but would get back to them next week.

And by that time, the work was completed. Or something like that

Usually the bosses of the firms who don't drive for a living anymore.

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IDFIMH