The Toronto Taxicab Industry: Past, Present and Future by Katherine Morley

"Too bad all the people who know how to run the country are busy driving cabs and cutting hair."                                                                                    —  George Burns Even though we don't often think about it, riding in a taxicab is a deeply significant experience. It is universal, in that many cultures have some form of taxi service, man-powered or motorized. This means that almost anyone, anywhere in the world could probably describe one taxi experience or another: good, bad, memorable, terrifying. In our culture, riding in a cab can feel decadent and luxurious. We may treat ourselves to a ride when we have to get somewhere in a hurry, after a party, or perhaps when we are going too far for our normal mode of transport. It can also feel like an expensive burden, forced upon us when there are no other travel options available.As children, we were driven everywhere. As adults we tend to do the driving ourselves, and don't spend much time in the passenger's seat. Being "driven" is completely different from "driving." In a cab, you pass through, and have the opportunity to see, the city in a different way. You are forced to socialize with a stranger in an intimate space, in a way that may or may not come naturally to you, or to your driver. Even if riding in a cab is a daily experience, you are always affected by it. Your mood may be altered by your experience in the cab: if you have a good ride, you might rave about it to your friends. If you have a bad ride, you might arrive at your destination feeling angry or anxious. Unfortunately, Toronto's taxicab industry is in a state of crisis. Revenues are down in the wake of 9/11 and SARS, there are too many cabs on the road per capita, drivers are underpaid and desperately unhappy, and feel as though they are at war with the policy makers and fleet bosses. Public perception of the entire industry is low, the government appears to have little understanding of how to manage and regulate the industry efficiently, and none of these issues shows any signs of improving.¹In order to understand how the once vital and honourable industry found its way into this ailing state, we must look at the many contributing factors: historic, economic, social and political. The PastThe Western taxicab industry cab traces its origins from the horse-drawn carriages that appeared in the urban centers of Europe during the Renaissance Era. From its inception, the cab was strictly a "city" phenomenon. It was during this era that the social classes began to divide, and a market for "livery", or uniformed staff, including that of professional drivers, sprung up. As towns transitioned into cities, a need arose for people to travel across neighbourhoods quickly, conveniently and at a low cost. Up until the seventeenth century, the coach industry was unregulated, probably because it wasn’t yet widespread practice or terribly practical to hire someone, and to be “driven”. The “Hackney Coach,” which usually refers to a four-wheeled, two horse carriage, appeared in England in 1600, and by 1654, there were 300 registered coaches for hire in London.² These public cabs were often the discarded coaches of the aristocratic families who had moved on to more luxurious forms of conveyance.³ The word "cab" itself comes from the French "cabriolet"; a lightweight, two-wheeled, horse-drawn carriage with a retractable roof that replaced the Hackney in London and Paris in the 1800s.⁴ The word "taxi" comes from "taxameter", a device that measured the rotation of the wheels to detect distance traveled, invented in 1891 by German Wilhelm Bruhn.⁵ According to the Transport For London Public Carriage Office, "the first horseless cab, the Bersey electric-powered vehicle, appeared in 1897 in London, followed by the first internal combustion engine cab in 1903."⁶ The first vehicle ever built specifically to be used as a taxicab, complete with "taximeter" was the Daimler Victoria, built in 1897 by Gottlieb Daimler.⁷ The first cab in Toronto was owned and operated by Thornton Blackburn, an African-American who escaped a life of slavery in Kentucky via The Underground Railroad, arriving in Toronto in 1834.⁸ He and his wife Lucie lived at the corner of Eastern Avenue and Sackville Street, and soon after their arrival in Canada, Blackburn had a one-horse cab built based on the ones he had learned about in Montreal. He painted it red and black and called it the “City Cab.”⁹ The City Cab held up to four passengers who entered from the rear of the carriage, while Blackburn sat on a box up front.¹⁰ Blackburn's one-man enterprise grew into the first cab company in Toronto, providing himself and Lucie with a very comfortable way of life, inspiring many other entrepreneurs to follow suit, and cementing the Blackburn name into the list of Toronto's most notable historical families.¹¹ By 1885, there were at least 284 registered cabs in Toronto (see Figure 5). Information and records from this era appear to be few and far between, but the City of Toronto Archives contain a log book, documenting "Breaches of Cab Law" covering a period between 1885 and1887, in which numerous cab driver infractions are recorded, by name, date, cab number, offence and punishment.¹² The existence of this book implies not only that the industry was somewhat regulated and structured by then, but also that one needed to have a license to drive a cab. There are no Blackburns mentioned anywhere in the book, although Thornton Blackburn lived until 1890¹³ So either he had already retired (which is likely, given how successful he was), or he was a law-abiding driver. (See Figure 1 for a reproduction of part of the detailed log book.) The archives also contain a large wall map entitled "Plan of the City of Toronto, Canada West", a beautiful, detailed, colour fold-out dated 1857. On the edge of the map, there is some information printed showing cab rates and zones within the city. Fares were calculated in zones, as the taximeter had not yet been invented. There were three fare zones, as laid out in Figure 2.The next official document in the public record is dated April 12, 1932, and entitled "Report of the Advisory Committee on Taxicabs to the Commissioners of Police of the City of Toronto". It appears that around this time, disorganization and dangerous and corrupt practices within the industry were becoming rampant. The inquiry began May 1931, with the idea of reforming the taxicab industry. It was the first of many such inquiries, but the most significant. This report states, on the first page, the Board's resolutions to: "provide our Citizens and visitors to our city with adequate taxi service, and safe vehicles, and at such rates to provide a fair rate to the operator and a reasonable rate to the user, and in order to maintain a healthy competition in the industry".¹⁴It goes on to establish that the reason for the report was the "deplorable condition" of the taxicab industry on many levels, but primarily caused by the "demoralization" of the drivers, who were struggling with the "large number of cabs in use", "excessive labour turnover and low earnings" for drivers and owners alike.¹⁵ It is important to note that this survey was conducted during the Great Depression, and the report takes this into account. Toronto's population in 1931 was just over 600,000 and there were 974 taxicab licenses distributed that year, therefore cab-to-human ration would have been around 1:600.¹⁶  The cab operators were slashing their rates desperately, running themselves into bankruptcy or resorting to corruption to make a living. The Committee felt strongly that the following issues should be reviewed and improved upon:1. Vehicles: safety, maintenance and types permitted for use.2. Types of services to be subject to regulation (included taxis, jitneys, ambulances, buses, limousines, hearses and self-drive cabs — the predecessor to rental cars. Hertz "Driveurself" was already in existence).3. Cab premises: upkeep and location.4. Cab stands: number and location. (There were thirty cab stands on Toronto streets in 1931. Since the subway system had not yet been built, they were likely situated near Union Station, which was completed in 1929 and central to two of the biggest hotels in the city, The King Edward [1903] and The Royal York [1929]).5. Cab drivers: rate of pay, qualifications and conduct.6. Business practices of brokerages, (dispatching services) which were seen as a "parasite" on the industry.7. The implementation of taximeters — and how to calculate fair fees — at this point it was not mandatory, only highly recommended, to install a taximeter at the owner's cost.8. Required insurance for all cab drivers.¹⁷ Three of the most significant changes that this Committee instigated were the dissolution of the zoned rates system (which was not standard between drivers and cab companies and therefore easy to abuse), the standardization of cab rates and introduction of taximeters, and the limitation of the number of licenses distributed each year.The report includes submissions from all of the interested groups, such as The United Taxicab Owners and The Board of Trade of The City of Toronto. These submissions express support for certain recommendations and opposition to others. For the most part, the industry supported the findings and recommendations of the Committee, and the template for legislation that resulted from it has remained in use, with periodic updates and revisions, ever since.The taxi industry began to recover and improve after World War II, and enjoyed reasonable prosperity until the beginning of the 1970s, when then Mayor of North York Mel Lastman began to conduct numerous reviews of the taxicab industry. In 1972 the "Special Committee Report on the Taxicab Industry" was composed of the Taxicab industry, Metro Council and an independent consulting firm. The report begins by stating: "Toronto has in the past, and is now, providing a taxicab service that is superior to that supplied by any other city in the United States or Canada. . . . No other jurisdiction [has] required the same regular check of taxicabs for mechanical safety and cleanliness and of taxicab meters for accuracy."¹⁹It concludes "…[T]axicabs and drivers in Toronto are generally held in high esteem"  — despite the many "internal problems" within the industry, particularly between "taxicab driver and owner."²⁰ Again the problem of an oversaturated market was mentioned; an industry expert was quoted as saying that the ideal saturation level is approximately one taxicab for every 800 citizens, and at the time, the ratio was 1:855, even though the report clearly states that the current by-law allowed for a ratio no lower than 1:975, The Metropolitan Licensing Commission (now known as The Municipal Licensing and Standards) realized it should not have been issuing licenses at such a high rate, if it wanted the industry to stay healthy. Subsequently, new bylaws were created, restricting the number of licenses available, and making it quite difficult to obtain a "plate" or license for a cab, except by inheriting or purchasing one, or by working long hours for a minimum of three years, in order to join an extensive waiting list. In 1974, there were roughly 750 names on the list.²²From the many reports during this era, it appears that the taxicab workforce was suffering under a lot of the same conditions as their predecessors: low wages, no job security, high driver turnover rates, intense competition, high overhead costs, and unfair and unregulated working conditions. (There was a taxicab union during this era, but membership was not mandatory, and its contributions were debatable. It no longer exists). However, Toronto drivers who have been driving since the 1970s look back fondly, and consider that "the golden age" of cab driving. Drivers could make a decent living if they knew the job well; seventy per cent owned their own cabs and had no one to report to; they were, for the most part, respected by the public and didn’t have to worry too much about getting robbed or killed on the job.²³ The industry was about to undergo serious changes. Firstly, it was around this time that changes in Canada's immigration policies resulted in increased non-European immigration to Canada. There was an influx of Caribbean, Middle Eastern, African and Asian newcomers to Canada. Operating a taxicab was seen as a worthwhile, entry-level position into the Canadian workforce, and driver demographics began to shift. Until this point, drivers had been Canadian citizens, (in fact, that was one of the bylaws put in place in the 1932 reformation²⁴) or, if a landed immigrant, of eastern European descent or American draft dodgers.²⁵ Suddenly, we began to see many new faces behind the wheels of our cabs. Secondly, big changes were afoot at the Metropolitan Licensing Commission, which was about to revamp the entire licensing system; and thirdly, Canada was about to enter a recession that would hit the tourism industry especially hard.   The Present    In 1998, Toronto Council put together another review of the taxicab industry. The most notable outcomes of this review were the following:1. Better maintained, younger fleets of cabs.2. More stringent training for prospective drivers, and regular retraining programs for long-time drivers.3. The Introduction of "The Passenger Bill of Rights" in an effort to improve sagging customer service.4. A renewed commitment to offer wheelchair-accessible cabs.5. The implementation of the Ambassador Cab system. ²⁶ An official correlation was made between the decline in customer service and the decline in owner-operators (down to twenty per cent since the 1970s)²⁷ and officials came to the conclusion that a program had to be created that would encourage more plate owners to actually drive their cabs, instead of leasing the plates or cabs to other drivers. Numerous proposals were considered and case studies were made of the flourishing New York, London, Vancouver and Halifax systems, among others. On October 7, 1998, the Taskforce to Review The Taxicab Industry released its review, outlining the new “Ambassador” plate program. Ambassador plates were conceived during the Municipal Taxi Reform that began in 1992 and culminated in the Taskforce Report of 1998. The Ambassador plate program was the brainchild of city councillor Howard Moscoe and the Municipal Licensing and Standards (MLS) department of the city of Toronto.²⁸ Along with the owner-driver decline, another impetus behind this decision was the rocketing monetary value of the standard plates, which have a legal status as an asset; they can be inherited or transferred upon the death of the owner, or sold to another licensed taxi driver. Previous to the reform, there were three ways to operate a taxicab:1. Own a standard plate2. Lease or rent a standard plate from an owner3. Drive a shift taxi for fleet owner or a brokerage like Beck Taxi. ²⁹  The most lucrative operating method was the ownership of a standard plate, which has seen street values ranging from $35,000 to $150,000 in the last ten years.³⁰ There was also a claim that street values of the hard-to-get cab licenses were too high, and were creating monopolies. The standard plate was very difficult to get, and a driver had to work full-time, for years, just to qualify for the waiting list. Since the Ambassador plate came into being, no new standard plates have been issued. An Ambassador plate entitles the bearer to own and operate his or her own cab, but not to lease or rent for shifts to any other driver. In theory, it seemed like a good idea to many drivers: the opportunity to be one's own boss is very appealing, and the driver's overhead costs are reduced by about $1000 per month (National Post, May 19, 2003). Consequently, there are over 3,000 drivers on the Ambassador waiting list.³¹ In practice, however, the Ambassador license seems to be doing more harm than good. Since the Ambassador is the only person allowed to use the cab to which the plate belongs, the cab is in use an average of twelve hours a day, unlike Standard cabs which may be run twenty-four hours a day. Some Ambassadors, in order to meet their overhead costs, find themselves driving fifteen or sixteen hours a day, which can lead to obvious driver-safety issues. If a driver gets sick or injured, he or she may not rent or lend the cab to another driver, and there are no health insurance or benefits. Although obtaining an Ambassador plate is cheaper than leasing a cab or taking shifts, the driver has the added financial responsibility of purchasing and maintaining a car. If the cab breaks down, the Ambassador is responsible for all repairs, in addition to losing money for time off the job. The Ambassador plate is not a legal asset. It cannot be inherited or sold and it dissolves upon the death of the bearer.³² This has led many disillusioned drivers to refer to it as a "permit" rather than a plate. Finally, and most important, the issuance of the Ambassador plates has created a glut of taxis on the streets of Toronto that prevents the Ambassadors and all the other drivers from making a decent living. To quote Peter McSherry, author of Mean Streets: Confessions of a Nighttime Taxi Driver, "You can't cut a pie into 5,000 pieces and expect to feed everybody." The actual cab-to human ratio in the GTA now sits at 1:508, well above the recommendations of the previous Taskforce's findings, placing Toronto among the highest cab-to-human ratios in the world. To make matters worse, the MLS began issuing Ambassador plates during the recession, and continued to issue them even in the wake of the SARS crisis, which devastated the timidly recovering Toronto tourism industry in 2003. The issuance of Ambassador plates is currently frozen, while the MLS re-examines the system and interprets feedback of plate holders. The problem is that many of the drivers who received the Ambassador plates are happy to be working independently, and don't necessarily correlate the decline of their income and the industry with their own Ambassador plates. The drivers that do realize it are angry and vocal, so the MLS receives mixed and passionate feedback about the program.Driving a taxi has gone from a lucrative, respectable career to one with long hours, little remuneration and little enjoyment. A typical driver averages between five and ten dollars per hour and generally works twelve hour shifts, six or seven days a week³³ — a grueling lifestyle that has taken its toll on the entire cab-riding experience. Chronic lower back problems, hemorrhoids and heart disease are extremely common complaints among full-time drivers, and morale is at an all-time low.³⁴ One driver I spoke to angrily referred to the current system as "Byzantine" and believes the MLS is not rushing to do anything about it because with all the new licensing and training requirements, municipal revenue has skyrocketed.Passengers have certainly noticed the change in quality of service — one that parallels the decline of the mental, physical and financial health of the drivers. They complain of dangerous, aggressive cab drivers who talk on cell phones and ignore their fares as well as the overall upkeep of the cabs. Cab users fall into two distinct groups: those who take cabs frequently because they are running late and those who plan their cab usage in advance and ride less frequently. Both types of user want to feel that the extra money they are spending on the cab ride is well spent, since it is more costly than their normal mode of transportation. They want to be made to feel like VIPs. ³⁵ In user-group studies, comfort in the cab was the number one issue for passengers, followed by having a "good driver", and convenient and quick rides. Many users listed the same basic elements when asked to describe their "ideal cab experience": a clean, well-maintained, roomy car; a polite, knowledgeable driver who is not preoccupied with a cell phone; quiet music and no two-way radio noise.³⁶ This kind of experience, according to the study, is almost unheard of.  The Future  Big changes need to be made to revive the Toronto taxicab industry. After the 1976 Olympics, Montreal experienced a problem with an overabundance of cabs that had been brought into service for the Games. They solved their problem easily by buying back the surplus licences at a fair rate from the drivers until their cab per capita rate was low enough to once again support the industry. Montreal now has one of the best, most efficient systems in the country.³⁷Obviously, this is not a financially-appealing solution for the City of Toronto, or they would already be employing it here. In addition, there are other factors involved in the inertia of the industry: 1. The money structure of the taxi industry.The drivers are suffering greatly from low ridership, but the upper levels of the industry are not. Lease and shift rates don't vary much, so the non-driving cab owners are maintaining their income. Brokerages and dispatch services are making record amounts because there are a record number of cabs on the road. The MLS is also making more money from a greater number of drivers, applicants, course fees, renewals, permits, and other tariffs. Users are wading through a sea of taxis — they rarely have trouble finding a cab quickly.  2. Driver attitudes.It should be possible to educate drivers on how to make their passengers feel more like VIPs in the cab. There are probably many, simple methods to train drivers to make their passengers and improve their tips. But the the MLS already mandates that all drivers take a "refresher" course every four years of driving a cab. The Taxicab Driver Refresher Course "is a 3-day course designed to enhance and/or reinforce the skill set of current taxicab drivers in the City of Toronto. The focus of the course is on providing superior professional customer service to the City's diverse clientele."³⁸This course is expensive, and just another of the many enforced fees the drivers resent paying to the city. "I’ve been driving a cab for over thirty years. I know more about it than they do," says McSherry.  3. Passengers will still use cabs. Everyone who has taken a taxi has had a bad or numerous bad experiences. The problem is that this does not stop people from taking taxis. It is not like a restaurant that you choose not to frequent after you get food poisoning from the clam chowder. You might take note of the bad driver, even phone in a complaint and ride a little less frequently, but there are no repercussions to the drivers (unless they've tarnished their driving record) and there is no viable alternative for you as the passenger. For example, the municipal code clearly states that no driver "shall use a cellular telephone while the taxi is for hire", but this law is clearly not enforced.  Autoshare and Zipcar may be giving Toronto taxis a small amount of competition, but so far they pose no serious threat. And none of the users that related bad cab experiences to me followed up by saying they would never take a cab again. The city is too big, and the public transit system is too underdeveloped to complete with the ease and convenience of a taxi. Passengers would like to have a better experience, but in truth, it is not affecting their usage. So how do we solve the taxicab problem in Toronto? The first step is to insist that the situation be viewed as a problem by the city and by all of the participants. So far, no council members, not even Howard Moscoe, who has been newly elected as Chair of Municipal Licensing and Standards, have come forward to say that the Ambassador system is a flop. A new review, by an independent taskforce should be conducted — one that reveals the realities of the industry as it stands, and refocuses on the viability and sustainability of the industry. The municipality should admit that the system is not working, and should find a tested, working model and implement it. It should also work to enforce the laws and regulations that exist within the Municipal Code. Perhaps the city could also invest in a public relations campaign to educate the drivers and fleet bosses on the importance of customer service, which might increase ridership rates. The problem is not fares — passengers do not feel they are being overcharged for taking a taxi. It is when the experience doesn't live up to the expense that they begin to seriously consider other forms of transportation, like public transit, walking, biking and carpooling. There will always be a market for cabs in the city, as long as it is both physical and emotionally accessible. A design-centric solution would be to redesign the taxicab and its physical relationship to the city, as well as the experience. One group in New York is doing just that. "Taxi 07" is a collective of designers from Parsons University, who are working together with city officials and the Public Space Committee to revamp the taxicab from the inside out. They are focusing on the passenger-driver relationship, interior layout and comfort, environmental impact of the vehicles, redesign of the streetscape, including taxi stands and passenger waiting areas, and are also looking at how the structure of the industry can be better integrated with public transit in the city. It is a bold, inspiring, project, and it has been taken very seriously by City of New York officials.With information, ingenuity, planning, creativity and support, the Toronto taxicab industry could easily be turned into a vital, enjoyable and efficient part of our city. After all, despite the failure of the Ambassador system, our taxicab drivers really are the ambassadors of our city. They are often the first people visitors to Toronto encounter, right outside the doors of the airport. Shouldn't they be encouraged to succeed, and enabled to promote a superior image of our city?  NOTES 1. Taken from a series of interviews conducted in Toronto, Sept-Oct 2006. 2. Hackney. Encyclopedia Britannica. December 3, 2003.<www.britannica.com>.3. About The PCO: History. Transport For London, The Department if Public Carriage Office. London: December 3, 2006. <www.tfl.gov.uk>.4. Ibid.5. Ask A Cabby. BBC America. December 3, 2006. <www.bbcamerica.com>.6 About The PCO: History. Transport For London, The Department of Public Carriage Office. London, December 3, 2006. <www.tfl.gov.uk>.7. Ask A Cabby. BBC America. December 3, 2006.  <www.bbcamerica.com>.8. Learn About Historic Houses Along Lost Rivers: Thornton and Lucie, Blackburn House. Lost Rivers. December 3, 2006. <www.lostrivers.ca>.9. Ibid.10. Ibid.11. Ibid.12. "Infraction Log Book. Breaches in Cab Law". Author unknown. Property of The City of Toronto Archives: Toronto, 1887.13. Learn About Historic Houses Along Lost Rivers: Thornton and Lucie, Blackburn House. Lost Rivers. December 3, 2006. <www.lostrivers.ca>.14. Report of the Advisory Committee on Taxicabs to the Commissioners of Police of the City of Toronto. Board of Commissioners of Police, City of Toronto, April 12, 1932. p. 1.15. Ibid. p. 3.16. Ibid. p. 85.17. Ibid. pp. 8–55.18. .Hansom Cab. Encyclopedia Britannica. December 3, 2003. < www.britannica.com>.19. Special Committee Report on the Taxicab Industry. Metropolitan Toronto Clerks Departments. Toronto, November 20, 1973. p. 4–5.20. Ibid. p. 4.21. Ibid. p. 7.22. Whyte, Jerome. A Description and Analysis of Interactions in The Taxi Industry And Some Suggestions For Improvement. Toronto, April 1974. p. 12.23. McSherry, Peter. Personal Interview. Toronto, October 29, 2006.24. Report of the Advisory Committee on Taxicabs to the Commissioners of Police of the City of Toronto. Board of Commissioners of Police, City of Toronto, April 12, 1932. p. 34.25. McSherry, Peter. Personal Interview. Toronto, November 18, 2006.26. West, Virginia. Taskforce To Review The Taxi Industry. Commissioner of Urban Planning and Development Services. Toronto, October 7, 1998 pp. 1–39.27. Ibid. pg 53.28. Duffy, John. Personal Interview. Toronto, October 21, 2006.29. Ibid.30. Ibid.31. Ibid.32. Canada Department of Municipal Licensing and Standards. Municipal Codes. Urban Affairs Library, Toronto, 2006. Bylaw 545-132.33. Various Personal Interviews of Cab Drivers, conducted Toronto. December 2005 to December 2006. 34. McSherry, Peter. Mean Streets: Confessions of a Nighttime Driver. Toronto: Hounslow/Dundurn Group, 2002. p. 13.35. Personal Research. Focus Groups, conducted in Toronto, Sept-Oct 2006.36. Ibid.37. Duffy, John. Personal Interview. Toronto: October 21, 2006.38. Ambassador Taxi Training. City of Toronto. September, 2006. <www.toronto.ca/taxitraining>. Other References: Arthur, Eric. Toronto: No Mean City. 3rd ed. Revised by Stephen A. Otto. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003. Buchwald, Emilie. Toward The Livable City. Minneapolis: Milkweed Editions, 2003. Gladwell, Malcolm. The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. Boston: Back Bay Books, 2002. McSherry, Peter. Mean Streets: Confessions of a Nighttime Driver. Toronto: Hounslow/Dundurn Group, 2002. Rifkin, Jeremy. The Hydrogen Economy: The Creation of the Worldwide Energy Web and the Redistribution of Power on Earth. New York: Tarcher/Penguin, 2002. Sewell, John. The Shape of The City: Toronto Struggles with Modern Planning. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993. Taxinews. Jan-Dec. 2006. Edited by John Duffy. West, Bruce. Toronto. Toronto: Doubleday Canada Limited, 1967.