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New marshalled rank… why? I think that the more marshalled ranks we have, the better. However, this issue of Call Sign tells of the latest addition to those at Liverpool Street and Cranbourn Street. This one is at Cornhill and if you work during the evening and early hours, you will know of the minicab touts that hang up in Cornhill by the Abacus nightclub. This club’s survival seems to have bucked the trend of those establishments that come and go and suggests it to be quite an upmarket place. In addition to a disco, it has a restaurant and bar and judging by the way those entering are dressed compared to some of London’s clubs, it sounds like a good place to pick up work. But you’d be lucky to even get close enough to the door because of the endless queue of touts – the majority with private hire stickers on their cars and, I’d bet, only a tiny minority of them with genuine booked trips to pick up. Anyone who has seen the excellent LTDA DVD on touting in London will know of the uphill battle we are facing against touting from private hire. But we already know all about it. The police know all about it. The PCO know all about it! So why has nothing been done? The police can’t be everywhere and contrary to some reports, the tout squad have done their best under Sgt Dave Hillson with the small numbers they have. But marshalled ranks do seem to be one answer and when the news from the PCO, the CoL Corporation and the new marshals in town (Taximarshalls.com) arrived on my desk about a marshalled rank at Cornhill, my immediate thought was that the Abacus touts would now be facing a battle. So although it doesn’t begin until next week (8 May), I thought I’d take a look to see how close it was situated to the club. So I went on a quiet Sunday… The new rank will be operational from 7pm through to 7am daily and marshalled Friday and Saturday evenings from 11pm until 2am. There are other parts of Cornhill that need taxis, so perhaps outside the club might not be the best place – even though just to the east of Abacus is the widest part of the road. But whoever has organised it has given us a rank opposite St Michaels Alley, which in addition to being at least 50 yards from the club, is also on the wrong side of the road and facing east. So from the club in the dark, not only wouldn’t you be able to pick out a rank of cabs, but you couldn’t even see their for hire signs because they are faced in the opposite direction! If I didn’t know better, I’d think that those behind this rank didn’t want to interfere with what seems to have become legitimised touting. But the marshals may not be too happy… Trouble in store? |
 the years by minicabs – and yes, many of whom have PCO licence stickers. Smiths of Smithfield suddenly have an amazing service again and our rank has been reclaimed, much to the upset of those the PCO refer to as licensed private hire, but who we childishly refer to as touts due to their hanging around outside the door looking to nick our work! Hopefully the PCO will soon make sure that the finish time of Smiths rank goes beyond the ridiculous 9pm it currently has. Nobu of Berkeley Street also now has an amazing taxi service once again, but things are different there. The doormen – in danger of losing some finance perhaps – try to push our drivers away. Nope, there is no rank there and had it been a matter of hailing a taxi as a punter came out, then fair enough. But the reason they don’t want us there is because we take up the room that the licensed touts need! However, again led by our victorious troops (!!!), things suddenly changed. And that takes us back to Abacus and the marshal who will be doing duty there. As we mentioned above, the rank must have been arrived in a competition to design the world’s worst-placed taxi rank! On Thursday 23 April, a DaC driver was arrested outside along with a tout. The driver had stopped there after seeing another taxi driver being set upon by several of the above mentioned touts. The driver was later released after spending some time in the cells. That same evening, traffic wardens cleared a stack of touts from the front of Abacus, giving the impression that someone was trying to help our cause. But equality is the PCO’s name and that same night they launched their own troops into the west end giving any empty cab passing a free MOT! Whoops! Cyclists |
Some travel so quickly that you just don’t
realise they are there. In fact, some cyclists now travel so fast that
unless you have an open road, you can’t keep up with them. Yes, as cyclist’s organisations are often keen to tell us, they put no harmful chemicals into the atmosphere. However, the number of pedestrians hurt by them must be going up all the time as their numbers increase. Let me make it clear; there are also many good, responsible cyclists who I personally have no problem with. But even they admit that there are many bad ones and certainly too many who think London’s streets are a perfect place to pretend they are in Le Tour de France. Is there an answer? Well yes there is. I’ve said it before and I’ll probably say it again: Licence every cyclist just as cars are. Then every cyclist would have a number plate where that rider could be reported if riding dangerously. Perhaps even ban racing bikes in town? After all, these bikes with wheel rims the thickness of this mag when closed are not designed to ride slowly, whereas London’s streets are no longer safe to speed along – especially during the daytime when most cyclists are out there. An excellent way of travel has been ruined by the large number of selfish cyclists who do exactly what they want, when they want and who care little for pedestrians, let alone other road users. Yep! Licence them all, make them identifiable and start fining those that ride dangerously by shooting along the inside at speed, ignoring traffic signals or who go straight across a pedestrian crossing while people are on it. If it’s wrong, then it’s wrong… Curse of the cash machines? End of another year Alan Fisher |
