picture by the Washington Post
No this woman is not competing on the "Biggest Looser", she is columnist Petula Dvorak of the Washington Post. My friend Moi recommended that I read her article which was pretty much a personal attack on DC cab drivers."Mad Cabbie, why do you have to post her picture? I can't read this blog and throw up at the same time! I will never read this blog again, you jackass!!!"
You're not the only one bro, just calm down and let me finish writing this post and I have more throwing up to do myself, maybe I will do so in front of 1150 15th Street NW.
Few months ago some retarded old fart called Lynne "The Botox" Breaux, who is the president of the Restaurant Association of Metropolitan Washington said, “DC is a world-class city with a third-class taxi system.”and Petula Dvorak added by saying:
"....That’s why it’s just kind of fun sometimes to take a cab, when I’m yearning for a trip to Cairo or wanting to relive the memories of a harrowing afternoon in rural China..........The rag-tag band of occasionally wretched cars that make up the taxi fleet in the nation’s capital hiked their rates again on Saturday......."
Listen, if you lived in this city long enough you know damn well that DC cabs in general came a long way and have improved a lot. With in the last ten years the fleets are becoming newer and newer, just go ask the folks at Bill Page Toyota! Hybrid Toyota cars are flying off the shelf, thanks to the Ethiopian cab drivers whom are the majority of cab drivers in this city. More cabs are accepting credit cards, majority of the drivers have driven in Washington for decades with full of experiences, all three major cab companies in DC are all GPS dispatched now and I can go on and on pointing out the improvements. All this said, I agree that there are some scumbag drivers out there who don't give a shit about their taxi operation. Ron Linton is trying to change the status-quo and it takes some time and he doesn't have a good qualified team at the Taxicab Commission to accomplish the tasks anytime soon. I don't necessary agree on all of what he is trying to do but he is doing something about it.
The fare increase is an important start, all the improvements that have been suggested would been impossible without the extra revenue. The fares were slashed by almost 30% in 2008 when they switched to meters and majority of drivers are struggling to survive with those cheap fare rates. Where were the cries for DC cabdrivers when the fares were slashed? And why would any passenger wants a driver who is overworked, underpaid and too tired to drive safely? All the media coverage is bitching about the 44% increase on the mileage rate, but the math is not that simple folks. I don't have the time to break down the calculation for you but if you throw in the fare slash of 2008 and the extra charges that they have taken away now, the fare increase comes up to a whopping 0.80% per year since 2008! Comprende Petula Dvorak?
I have been to quite a few third world countries including Cairo and Little Rock Arkansas, there is no comparison between the third world and DC cab services like you and Lynne Breaux claim it to be, it's not even remotely close. Petula, you are a typical ignorant douchebag, if you were trying to be a comedian please don't leave your day-job. Just try to invest five minutes to do a little research before you start typing! I just can't believe you're walking the same halls at the Washington Post with some of the greats like Micheal Wilbon, Tony Kornheiser, Eugene Robinson and Marc Fisher. Just keep on stealing the pay-checks for the garbage you put on the Post, in the mean while the days of cheap fares to haul your fat ass are OVER!!!
Lynne Breaux, how about addressing issues on some of the rat infested overpriced mediocre DC restaurants? Instead of sticking your wrinkled ass nose in our business, get some real work done.
Let me go throw up now,
Please don't forget the homeless,
Mad Cabbie.
19 comments:
I have been to quite a few third world countries including Cairo and Little Rock Arkansas...
Mad that is CLASSIC!
We got your point MC but why personally attack her apperance?
I have worked with Petula before and she is one of those writers who contradict herself all the time, but for some reason she still have her job at the Post.
Still love your blog and I wish you update your blog more often
I am not surprised at all, that whack job wrote some nonsense article about kids growing up in middle class America.
Trish
From the driver's seat you lose all perspective, Mad! I had to take a cab recently, and the driver kept the windows fogged up on purpose to go slow... The cab ride before that was also strange... the driver tried to take me toward SW instead of SE until I asked where in $@* we are going, then he went the wrong way on one of the Mall's one-way streets (to kill time) until an unmarked vehicle went NARK at him! Oh, and then there's the oops-I-accidentally-reset-the-meter trick! Bottom line, - what are you complaining about?!
I think Mad is bitching about the way the Post reporter generalized all the cabbies, if you read her article.
I expect no better from a Guilty White Liberal columnist for the Official Organ of the Compulsionist-Socialist Party of the Nanny States of America.
The Post has a long history of ignorant columnists who have printed hateful drivel about cab drivers. I guess that SOMEbody had to replace Bob Levey as Head Ignoramus at that bankrupt scandal rag.
Oh, and Mr. Mad Cabbie, you forgot to add something to the hotel people who want to regulate us to death. We can start with their job selling doormen. When drivers and company officials go to the Assistant Manager with proof of the job selling, nothing happens. We have tried to demonstrate that their guests are being cheated by these job-buying drivers, as they charge back to the customer what they paid the doorman, but they do not care.
We can continue with their price gouging when Congress is considering 'weighty matters' or there is a major event in the City. A thousand dollars a night to sleep in some closet in a flea-infested former flophouse? Get real.
These hotel and restaurant people can not even run their own business, but they want to micromanage ours? Our alleged 'industry representatives' on this sham of a Taxicab Commission are from the hotel and restaurant associations: organisations that have been on record for at least thirty years as hostile to the interests of the drivers. His Exalted Supremacy Adri-Amin Felonty thought that he had pulled the proverbial wool over our eyes on that one.
More, lest I exceed my character limit
In continuation......
Mad Cabbie raises an important point on revenue needed to pay for these improvements that the riding public wants. Forcing us to travel over third class roads in third class traffic conditions for sixth class rates allows us only to purchase third class vehicles, at best. Trust us, Petula Dvorak, Guilty White Liberal Busybody Extraordinnaire, we do not want to drive these hoopties any more than you want to ride in them. You were not here, then, Mrs. Dvorak, but I will take you back a bit. Up until 1996, or so, most of the cabs in this City were beat up Volares, Aspens, Diplomats, and Chevy Caprices that were a minimum of eight years old with a modal age of eleven years. In 1996, the DCTC gave us a substantial raise. What happened? You started seeing Lincoln Town Cars as cabs. I bought one of the early ones.
With these rates, we will be able to afford better equipment. Most of us will buy it. As Mad Cabbie correctly indicates, the DCTC, the Harrassment Inspectors and the Test Station can get rid of the hoopties. With these rates, these drivers had better start taking credit cards if they want to get paid. People just do not carry that kind of cash any more. Customers will wave off the no-card-taking driver in favour of the card accepting driver.
I may be pushing my character limit, again.
In continuation...
Mrs Dvorak, you are in America. You STILL have choices, despite the best efforts of the DNC. While you might not be able to choose who pulls over for you, you CAN choose to ride, or not.
If he is yakking on the telephone, demand that he hang up. If he gives you lip, wave him off. If his car smells, do not get in, wave him off. Make sure that he has a hack licence (face card). If he is not showing it, do not get in. If the car is throwing smoke, sitting funny, has bald tyres or smells like gasolene, do not get in. If it is over twenty-nine degrees centigrade and the windows are down, wave it off. If it is a cab with suburban plates, do not get in. With all these illegals and suburban cabs working in the City illegally that the Authorities tolerate, you will get a ride in a legitimate veihcle with a properly licenced driver. Poor service persists because people tolerate. Caterwauling about it does nothing. Do not patronise substandard cabs and they will bring their places of business and attitudes up to standard or they will have no customers.
We DO NOT NEED all this gubbamint overregulation and misguided enforcement. The market will take care of that.
And one more thing, Mrs. Dvorak. Did the possibility EVER occur to you that the foul oh-DEAR! that you blame on the driver's 'pungent lunch' might be the 'pungent lunch' that his last customer was carrying or the less-than-regular bathing habits of his last customer?
Glad you read it Mad! I miss Raw Fisher, Marc Fisher was a class act.
Moi
JESUS!! You are really mad, Mad!
She's a cow who CLEARLY never had a cab ride in Cairo - I am not squeamish, but I kept my eyes shut for that one!! I figured my flinching and squeaking wasn't helping matters. We got there and back in one piece. You gotta trust the professionals.
She obviously has other battles - it is a shame she took it out on the noble DC Cabbies.
Love ya!
Peg
Mad Cabbie, I was out drunk with my buddies the other night and on our way home I told the cabbie to pull over in front of the Washington Post....and guess what I threw up right there by the stairs!
That was for you Mad Cabbie...Thanks for the laughs of the last six years.
CHEARS.
It's most fair to compare DC cabs to other American cities, and clearly DC cabs and cabbies do not fare well here. It's common practice in most places to simply give an address and the driver will get you there--yet DC cabbies often insist on directions so you need to know exactly where you're going.
The reference to credit cards is a joke. I'm in a DC cab probably 2-3 times a week and can't remember the last time I had the option of paying with credit card.
Major change is needed and must be imposed upon DC cabbies because they will not accept it otherwise. I remember being here when they switched to meters, and most cabbies argued that it made more sense to have a complicated zone system. That's what we're dealing with here...
It's a bullshit when people say DC cabbies don't know where they going.
Average DC cabbie has driven for at least 15 years and most of them do know their stuff, I have an uncle who is still driving. There are all kind of colorful drivers with characters who know the city very well like Mad Cabbie. I have driven cab in DC in the late 70's and early 80's while attending GWU, trust me there is a HUGE change for the better. Now I practice law in Philadelphia and you guys don't know what a bad service is, so stop crying!
Former Cabbie///
They may know the city itself, but any trip into MD or VA is an adventure--if they're willing to take you that is. I can't tell you how many times DC cabs have refused to pick me up because my destination is VA. It's become such a problem I should start taking their license plate and reporting them.
I understand it's in their interest to make multiple trips within the city limits, but if you're not willing to take people from point A to point B you should find another profession.
I probably sound like such an Arlington snob, but seriously--GPS and credit cards! Is that too much to ask!
How do we get Mr. William a credit card cab? Perhaps Mr. Wm. can get his own. If I were Mr. Wm., and I AIN'T (I don't live in Virginia), I would call one of the four services (yes there is another-TAXI-TAXI is in the City), Diamond, Schaeffer, Yellow or TAXI-TAXI and ask for a credit card cab.
Don't wanna' pay no two bucks extra for calling? Go out to the street. Next, you have a choice. Walk up to various cabs at lights or on public stands and ask if he can take a card. Eventually, you will get one. Some people have taken to holding up a card as they hail a cab. I would be careful doing this, lest someone snatch the card from your fingers. I accept cards, for ANY fare: you do not have to be going to Dulles or Friendship Airports. Card accepting cabs are 'apposta' have a sign on the outside indicating what cards they accept, but I AIN'T gotten a Round Tuit for that one, yet.
So, it appears that Mr. Wm. can get his ol' tarjeta a credito accepted. When more people do this, the providers begin to realise that they AIN'T-A-GONNA' get NO customers unless they can accept a card. Yup, we IS in 'Murrica. We have a CAPITALIST system, here. The market demands, the provider rises to meet the demand, OR he can go O-W-T of business. SEE how easy? YOU do something for YOURSELF instead of expecting the gubbamint to do it fer ya'.
Now, I know Arlington, so I DON' need NO new-fangled GPS, or map, but, for other jurisdictions, would you mind terribly if I used a map instead of a GPS? I find the map more reliable and easy to use.
As for transporting to Arlington, or other suburbs: it used to be that you could be compelled to transport ONLY within the District of Columbia. They changed the rule, about 1989, or so, in response to the numerous complaints about refusal to transport to PEE GEE CEE, as the demographic change in the jursidiction had, by then, become obvious. Now, they require you to transport anywhere in the Metropolitan Area.
A driver with the right lawyer and judge could beat that, as the jurisdiction of the Taxicab Commission does not extend beyond the boundaries of the District of
Columbia.
There seems to be a problem with the dispatch system. I know people who work at the Kreeger tell me they have great difficulty getting cabs when they call. I thought it was just my part of town.
Also I would read this blog more often if it were black letters on white background, much kinder to the eyes.
Anonymous,
You make my point for me. You write that cab drivers are required to take you anywhere in the DC area. Yet, when I'm hailing a cab from Dupont, U St, Adams Morgan and going to Arlington, many will shut the door before I can get it. All I'm asking is for DC cabbies to play by the rules--I think that's fair.
Regarding credit cards, if cab drivers (or their companies rather) were such good business people, they'd probably realize it's in their interest to install credit card machines. People are more likely to use services when it's convenient. Some bar owners are still cash only, but they don't realize that accepting plastic will A)potentially increase your customer base and B)people will simply spend more when it's on a card. Granted that's not an apples to apples comparison with the cab industry, but if I were running a DC cab company I'd want to install credit card machines in all my cabs before the other companies did--get ahead of the curve. Again, it's about convenience--I shouldn't have to place a call and request a "credit card cab." Again, this is common in other cities and jurisdictions so please tell me why DC cabs can't do this?
William,
RE: "Yet, when I'm hailing a cab from Dupont, U St, Adams Morgan and going to Arlington, many will shut the door before I can get it. "
Never tell a driver your destination until you're sitting in the car and have shut the door. Some will still decline if they don't like the destination, but I think this practice reduces the numbers. Sometimes, I respond to a decline by saying, "Come-on -- it's only 12 miles and I'll give you a good tip) and it works. Additionally, if you're seated in the car you can take note of their driver id (assuming they have it on display)
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