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New York Taxis Will Go Hybrid
Jason Siegel writes "The New York Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) has approved the Clean Air Taxicabs Pilot Program Act, paving way for a hybrid car to be approved for NY taxi service by this fall. Soon, a large portion of New York's yellow cars will also be "green." According to the Coalition Advocating for Smart Transportation (CAST) poll, seven out of ten of the state's citizens support a switch to hybrids." New York might also reduce car pollution by loosening the rules for running a taxi, in order to reduce the need for private cars.
But do they really think that one city will change anything? I think this is a step in the right direction if everybody starts using more efficient/ less waste cars, but why make such a big deal over the first step?
Because it's a bit hard to take a second step before you've taken your first one?
Besides, this isn't the first such programme. Even in India, buses, taxis and rickshaws are required to use CNG, compressed natural gas, which is less poluting than traditional vehicle fuels.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
well, NYC is the biggest city in the country.
NYC also has its share of gridlock and stop and start driving. isn't that the kind of driving that can be handled well by a hybrid? i realize the cabbies will have to be instructed on the techniques that optimize efficiency of a hybrid. when you spend your working hours driving a car around and when the high cost of gas effects your bottom line, you will probably do what you can to get that extra mileage.
at the same time it will help the rest of the population by lowering pollution.
1) Taxi Meddalions (the license to operate a taxi) can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. I think I remember reading that one sold a few years ago for over $350,000.
2) The people driving the taxis, they don't look like the wealthy type.
They should deregulate all taxis. Maybe prices would fall if there was free competition. I know, on days I am short on money, I would like to slap a taxi sign on my car and drive down to the airport. A couple hours later, I would have enough money to go back to the bar.
And I love the idea of green friendly cars. I think it is a step in the right direction. But what would be better than legislation is a green friendly car that gets 60+ mpg and has a sticker price of around $9,000. They would sell like hotcakes (which I think the Geo did for a while).
Will we get a cheap green car? I think we will, but probably not from Ford, GM, or Chrysler. I bet it will come from a hyundi or some asian car. The most attractive thing about a green friendly car is the MPG it gets, which appeals to people who don't want to get raped at the gas pumps. Unfortunatly, those people are not the ones buying $50,000 SUV's, they are the ones in economy sized cars.
Lower the price, and everyone will be buying them.
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This isn't just "one city". This is New York City. The biggest in the country (don't give me any BS about LA, which isn't a city at all, but a county, a mutant suburb). Clogged with cars, though few New Yorkers own one. When you get the equivalent of 24K cars to stop pumping filth into the air, especially in the 26 sq mi of Manhattan, you're taking back breathing for about 10M people. That's a big change. Even if no one else ever follows our lead, we're better off - which is what we care about in NYC: doing right by ourselves first.
But others will follow. Not only does our size set the pace for lots of other cities, globally, but we're smart. When we figure out how to do things, we do it right, and others follow us. If you don't know why NYC is a "big deal", you haven't been here, or you don't know the meaning of the words "big" or "deal".
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Let's think about this for a minute: If we do nothing and the environmentalists turn out to be right, we're screwed. On the other hand, if we go ahead and reduce our pollution output and it turns out global warming doesn't exist, then we've merely wasted* money. I, for one, would rather be poor than dead.
*let alone the fact that it wouldn't even be a waste then -- reducing pollution via reducing fossil fuel use would have other benefits, such as allowing people with asthma to be able to breathe in the cities (and possibly stopping kids from contracting it in the first place), stopping acid rain, reducing dependence on foreign oil, etc.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Some do buy used cars, police or otherwise. Others buy new cars. Then they spend big bucks upgrading them to spec. Cabbies have told me it cost them anywhere from $10-25K upgrading cars.
I don't think that hybrids cost $20K more than their non-hybrid competition. If gasguzzling cabs get something like 10MPG, the way I do in NYC traffic (in my 25MPG highway car), and gas is $2.50:gallon, that's $0.25:mile. $10K is 40K miles, which cabs probably do in 6 months. So even a $20K premium on a hybrid (which doesn't exist) is repaid in a year. Cabs seem to stay on NYC streets for about 5 years, so that's a 4:1 payback, of a significant investment (again, assuming the investment is anything like that large - otherwise it's a much higher rate of return on a small investment).
Then consider the halved refueling downtime, among NYC's scattered gas stations and fleet garages, and the money is really compelling. Since NYC pays for lots of services related to gas consumption (fuel transport regulation, asthma healthcare, etc), it's got its own financial stake. Then consider the less-direct savings, in breathable air, less-dirty buildings, less dependence on foreign oil, and hybrids are the way to go.
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Which is what a diesel is good at. An idling diesel uses next to no fuel, whereas an idling petrol just drinks the stuff down.
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When my wife and I were looking to get a new car, we wanted to get a Prius, but the 2004's hadn't even been out for a few months yet, and every dealer we called told us there was a 6 month to a year waiting list.
So we bought a Corolla instead. It costs virtually the same to fill up the tank, it gets close to the same highway gas mileage (in fact it probably would get the same if it had the same low rolling resistance tires) and cost it us about $5,000 less than a comparably equipped Prius (minus sunroof) even if we could get our hands on one. And we'll never have to worry about replacing the batteries.
Also, the tax rebate is rapidly going down towards zero. And it's not a rebate, only a deduction. A lot of people got away with claiming the credit because the ruling was poorly worded early on, but in more recent years tax forms they added a line specifically stating that hybrid vehicles do not quilify for the tax credit.
Our Corolla is approaching 20,000 miles now, and I did the math a little while back and figured out that we would still be a very long way from making back the difference in price between the two cars in fuel savings. Of course, the amount of city driving we do is virtually negligible as neither my wife or I drive to work most days.
For something like a New York taxi cab, I think a hybrid car makes a lot of sense (although if New York cabbies drive anything like Chicago cabbies, I don't think that any available hybrid is going to have nearly enough power to meet the demands of the job), but I suspect very few ordinary drivers put on enough city miles to really save a lot of money by getting a Prius if you compare it to an equivalent non-hybrid vehicle.
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I think the biggest obstacle getting hybrid taxis on the road is the lack of taxi-sized cars with hybrid engines. I was in New York last year and their cabs have quite a few safety mods for the driver and passenger.
For instance, there's a wall between the driver and the passenger side of the cabin. That's going to be pretty tough to squeeze into any car smaller than a Crown Vic.
This is a problem specific to New York cabs. And loosening up the specs for taxis may not be the answer -- they were put there for a reason.
This won't be a problem in cities like Toronto and Vancouver, where the Prius can already be seen ferrying around people.
The only two large(r) sedans that have hybrid engines are the Prius and the Accord. If the big three were smart, they'd build a hybrid engine for small trucks with their Japanese partners to lower development costs (Ford/Mazda, Chrysler/Mitsubishi, GM/Toyota) and stick those suckers in the Crown Vic/500, Magnum/300 and the Impala/Regal.
--- Dan