CHESHIRE EAST:
Hackney carriages will have to be able to take wheelchairs under new council guidelines. Hackney carriages operate under differ- ent rules in the old borough council areas - Macclesfield, Con- gleton and Crewe. The licensing commit- tee has now agreed new rules for Cheshire East which include a condition that hackney carriages in Maccles- field - like traditional black cabs - must be wheelchair accessible, in line with Congleton and Crewe.
The rules will come
into effect if there are no objections during a 12-week consultation. They will not apply to private hire vehicles. Cllr Carolyn Andrew asked whether it was fair for taxi drivers to spend the money before government guidelines are intro- duced. But councillors agreed that because hackney cabs can be hired on the spot, dis- abled people should be able to hire them easily. Melvyn Martin, who runs Bollington Black Cab, told the Maccles- field Express: “Cabs to take wheelchairs can
LICHFIELD: DRIVER HITS OUT AT CAB SIGN LAWS
A taxi driver from Burnt- wood has claimed that “draconian” council regulations which restrict the size of car signs advertising his business are affecting trade. Terry Airey, who has run Terry’s Taxis for the past ten years, said Lichfield District Coun- cil had moved the goalposts on how pri- vate hire companies in the area could adver- tise on their vehicles. He said the rules, which the council stat- ed as signs ad- vertising the taxi com- pany should be no bigger than 60cm x 30cm on front side doors and 60cm x 15cm on front bonnet and rear boots, were behind the times. As part of private hire agreements taxis must also have signs for Lichfield District Coun- cil, sized at 46cm x 14cm.
Mr Airey has already had to remove Terry’s Taxis signs from one of his new cars. He told the Cannock and Lich- field Chronicle: “I’ve paid £28,000 for a
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brand new vehicle but I can only have an A4- sized sticker to advertise my business. “Every other council around here you can advertise how you like, Cannock and Tam- worth included. But Lichfield is so dracon- ian; it makes you wonder who thinks these ideas up.
“They’ve moved the goalposts and none of us are very happy about it - it’s affecting a lot of trade.”
In 2001 the local authority refused to let Mr Airey expand his home-run operations, before he found office space in Lichfield. He has had other dis- agreements about signs and in 2006 he lost an appeal to allow six passengers to trav- el in his Kia Sedona. “Everybody’s strug- gling to make a living but the council is dic- tating what we can and can’t advertise - we can barely adver- tise our own name. But they’re more than happy to have us advertising them and the Lichfield Garrick.
“If I had a Terry’s Taxis sign any bigger they’d take me off the road.” Cllr Ian Pritchard, Lichfield District Coun- cil’s cabinet member for housing, health and environmental protection, said they were simply enforcing pre-existing rules and ensuring drivers con- formed with the council’s conditions. “We license and regu- late taxi companies across the district, to make sure they are safe for their cus- tomers,” Cllr Pritchard added.
“When people pre- book a taxi or use one from a taxi rank, they need to know they are getting into a properly licensed and insured vehicle.
“This is why it’s impor- tant that our signs do not compete with the taxi’s own branding. We don’t use our signs to promote the Lichfield Garrick or any council services. The primary function of our signs is to simply show people that they are entering a fully licensed and insured cab.”
ROUNDTHE... RUSHMOOR:
NEW GUIDELINES FOR WHEELCHAIR ACCESS
cost a lot more. Mine cost £30,000 and some drivers may not want to spend the extra money.” A ban on tow bars was renewed for hackneys and private hire vehi- cles. The committee also decided that all taxis over seven years old must be tested twice a year. Rules on tinted windows said rear side windows must allow at least 70 per cent light through so passengers feel safe, but members voted to remove the condition on cost grounds.
More than one third of taxis checked in Alder- shot and Farnborough were found to be defective in some way last year, the council has said.
An improved service was needed to increase the safety of passengers and pro- vide a better,
faster
service to taxi drivers, licensing manager John McNab said. Speaking to members of Rushmoor Borough Council’s borough services committee in Farnborough, Mr Mc- Nab said the high rate of failure showed the council’s current poli- cies to regulate the taxi trade were not working. According to the Sur- rey/Hants Star, in 2010/11 there were 55 random vehicle checks carried out on taxis
COUNCIL ADMITS REGULATION MUST IMPROVE in Rushmoor.
and PHVs in Aldershot and Farnborough. Of those, only 62 per cent were found to be satisfactory, with 14 per cent failing basic VOSA safety tests and another 28 per cent being of concern to licensing officers. Speaking at the meet- ing, Cllr Mike Roberts said: “To have 38 per cent of vehicles that don’t meet the stan- dards is quite appal- ling,” he said. “We will have to do more ran- dom checks to make sure that the taxi trade in our borough is up to standard.”
Mr McNab said the failures had come to light as part of the council’s ‘systems thinking intervention’ - a complete analysis of how the council licensed taxi vehicles
AIRPORT RANK WOULD COST £900,000 LEEDS:
It will cost more than £900,000 to build a taxi rank on the edge of Leeds Bradford Air- port, senior councillors have been warned. According to the Brad- ford Telegraph and Argus, Leeds City Council’s executive board is looking at options of building a taxi rank next to the site amid concerns about current arrangements at the Yeadon airport. As previously report- ed, taxi drivers and passengers have been upset in recent months by a new £2 “kiss and fly” fee charged for any driver to use the airport’s forecourt drop-off facility.
An increase in the num- ber of people parking illegally in Whitehouse Lane, which runs alongside the airport, has been noticed. With a contract be- tween the airport and
Arrow Cars for the exclusive provision of service at the Yeadon site going on until 2014, councillors have been increasingly con- cerned about taxi access at the site. But a report to the executive board says creating a new rank along White- house Lane could cost up to £905,000.
The report, by Andrew Hall, says £515,000 would be needed for “professional fees and the diversion of public utility equipment”, £325,000 for the exca- vation and disposal of contaminated materials and resulting landfill tax, and £65,000 for landscaping and cus- tomer waiting facilities. Mr Hall says a previous public consultation revealed ward council- lors for Otley and Yeadon and taxi owners and operators were supportive of a new
rank, but airport bosses did not support the option, with concerns about impact on access to the airport, safety issues and adverse impacts on future devel- opment plans.
The report says airport bosses have offered to alleviate concerns by extending a scheme under which, for an annual charge of £25, taxis and other cus- tomers can drop off and wait for up to 15 min- utes. They have offered to extend the drop-off period to 30 minutes. Work to extend the ter- minal is being carried out at the airport and Mr Hall says the execu- tive board could instruct officers to liaise with airport bosses about a forecourt man- agement plan through a review being carried out as part of planning conditions for the ter- minal extensions.
PHTM NOVEMBER 2011
The process analysed all the strengths and weaknesses of the council’s current process, with the aim of designing a better system from scratch. As well as raising stan- dards of safety and providing value for taxi passengers, the coun- cil wanted to provide a faster turnaround for taxi drivers, who cur- rently had to wait several months for new licence applica- tions.
Qamer Yasin, the coun- cil’s head of housing and environment, said the council would be putting together pro- posals on how to improve the service over the next few months, with the inten- tion to bring in a new system early next year.
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