Annoying taxis discussed at Village Council meeting
Last night Village Council member Michelle Niemeyer brought up the many taxis that hover on Virginia Street. A couple of weeks ago, Michelle was driving on the street and she was in an auto accident caused by a taxi cab driver driving backwards at a fast rate of speed. Apparently he was in a rush (backwards) to get to the Mayfair Hotel for a fare.
In his rush, he slammed into Michelle's car, causing injuries, which caused her to be taken to Mercy Hospital. She is doing fine now, but now her quest is to have the taxi cabs removed from Virginia Street all together. They race around as if they own that street and they double park, take up metered spots and are a nuisance according to neighbors.
Another concern is that they take up parking spaces on Virginia and don't pay for parking. The spaces are earmarked for the public and taxis are prohibited from using them but they do use them. I have seen them eating there, waiting there, sleeping there, and never paying for parking. When the police ask them to move, they do move, but that is hardly ever.
There are two dedicated taxi stands near the Mayfair Hotel, in front of Angelo and Maxie's.
Ron Nelson, Comm. Marc Sarnoff's Chief of Staff, spoke with the County about moving the taxis from the dedicated parking stands and having them banned from parking anywhere on Virginia Street. According to him, it an easy process to have them moved.
Of course we need taxis in the Grove. But just not there. Florida Avenue was suggested as an alternative for two taxi spots. And when hotel guests need a cab, they can easily be summoned by the valets or doormen at the Mayfair.
Angelo and Maxie's would love those two taxi stand spots on Virginia Street for outdoor tables if the taxis are assigned to spaces around the corner.
Of course the old Parking Authority was then dragged in, because if you take some spots elsewhere, they would have to be rented or purchased from the Parking Authority, and of course, ironically, Angelo and Maxie's would have to pay the Parking Authority for the right to have tables out on the street.
In his rush, he slammed into Michelle's car, causing injuries, which caused her to be taken to Mercy Hospital. She is doing fine now, but now her quest is to have the taxi cabs removed from Virginia Street all together. They race around as if they own that street and they double park, take up metered spots and are a nuisance according to neighbors.Another concern is that they take up parking spaces on Virginia and don't pay for parking. The spaces are earmarked for the public and taxis are prohibited from using them but they do use them. I have seen them eating there, waiting there, sleeping there, and never paying for parking. When the police ask them to move, they do move, but that is hardly ever.
There are two dedicated taxi stands near the Mayfair Hotel, in front of Angelo and Maxie's.
Ron Nelson, Comm. Marc Sarnoff's Chief of Staff, spoke with the County about moving the taxis from the dedicated parking stands and having them banned from parking anywhere on Virginia Street. According to him, it an easy process to have them moved.
Of course we need taxis in the Grove. But just not there. Florida Avenue was suggested as an alternative for two taxi spots. And when hotel guests need a cab, they can easily be summoned by the valets or doormen at the Mayfair.
Angelo and Maxie's would love those two taxi stand spots on Virginia Street for outdoor tables if the taxis are assigned to spaces around the corner.
Of course the old Parking Authority was then dragged in, because if you take some spots elsewhere, they would have to be rented or purchased from the Parking Authority, and of course, ironically, Angelo and Maxie's would have to pay the Parking Authority for the right to have tables out on the street.
posted by Tom Falco at 10:00 AM
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11 Comments:
Id rather have taxis hovering as an option for people who have had too much to drink instead of climbing in their cars and driving away because its more convenient than calling a cab and waiting for it to find you. Do all you people really do at these meetings is bitch and complain? Sometimes coming up with good ideas but never following through with them? Seems to me you should seek out more members of these committees who are younger more energetic and in tune with a lot of the traffic the grove sees, wants and needs for it to be a more notable destination you want it to be. If you want an old hippy retirement community, than I guess bitching and moaning would sound about right.
i think we should have 3 taxi stands.
1 there, or accessible to mayfair (w/4 spots), another over by jaguar, and lastly another over by greenstreet.
why not give the maitre-ds of restaurants, a way to call the cabs easily for their guests.
anonymous is right that it beats having drunk drivers.
In a perfect world, we would have taxi stands and the traffic to use them. However, the Grove's current layout doesnt have the space for them as taxi stands take away from customer parking. I dont see why taxis cant chill out over by that parking lot off of Mary and be called to action from a hotel? That lot is usually empty.
I do agree with Anon about getting younger folks involved rather than the older folks who want to go all Cher and "turn back time". Live in the now, man!
Anon 10:43 has an excellent point about "coming up with good ideas but never following through". Good examples of this would be the tourist brochure and map which were mentioned on this blog in a post on February 3rd. Three and a half months later (and after another season has slipped away),
where are the two items that any competent graphic artist, given the go-ahead without endless committee nit-licking, could have knoocked out in a couple of weeks?
Cabs are needed. Michele's accident was misfortune for sure, but let's not put that into our consideration here. There is no causal connection between where cabs sit and some idiot cabbie recklessly crashing into someone. Keep it straight grape, don't pile on randome events for the sake of it. It hurts your argument and you lose credibility.
Whatever else you can say about it, something is very wrong if you have taxis going backwards, running into cars. The standard is to have a queue of cabs, first one in line gets the fare. When the queue of cabs is full, excess cabs park elsewhere and wait for a space, or circle the block - driving forward, never backing up into a space more than one car length. Double parking is prohibited. Simple. May require some enforcement until the drivers are trained.
I say focus your energy on pushing to Lower Garage Prices. You'll fill empty garage capacity (excess fixed supply should mean lower prices anyway right?) and kill the argument for cheapos like me that you save $3-$5 by parking on the street. The benefit? You can give all the street space you want to Taxis and make the Grove a safer/more convenient tourist/drunkard destination.
This is just like everything else, it wasn't you who ended up in the hospital for 4 days. And it wasn't you kept awake all night long by loud music. Age has nothing to do with it. I have never seen a "drunk" or "overly imbibed individual" crawl into one of those cabs. Why not put up a cab number on those Grove marquees?
The Mayfair Hotel is really showing its age. Try doing what the Sonesta Bayfront Hotel Condo has sucessfully been doing since they opened their doors in 2002. When a guess or resident needs a taxie, they ask the front desk clerk to call one. Within 5 minutes a taxie is waiting in front. Simple.
Cabs can line up on 27th Ave across frm the Ritz and be anywhere in the Village in 2 minutes provided they don't slam into any of our residents.
I didn't support the 5 am closings but have to say I hope we don't need taxis hanging around to pick up the drunks at the hour my accident took place: 8:30 a.m. on a Friday!
The driver who hit me is always parked on Virginia, and frequently drives recklessly. There should definitely be enforcement there. I was surprised to learn that in all the internet info on the County website for cab drivers, there is not one suggestion that they should drive safely.
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