London Banter - View Single Post

[email protected] · October 7th 15, 07:40 AM posted to uk.transport.london

In article ,
(JNugent) wrote:

On 06/10/2015 01:09, wrote:

In Cambridge the station forecourt taxi rank is not public highway. This
means the railway charges taxi drivers a tidy annual sum for access and
limits it to only some hackney carriages. Any activity with queues could
only happen with the co-operation of the railway company. I tried to get
the council to insist that the new rank being created in the current
station redevelopment would be public highway but this was successfully
resisted by the railway industry.

There has to be another taxi rank further from the station but on the
public highway to allow for the next time the railway company tries to
raise the charges excessively to a level the trade won't pay. Happened
in BR days and again 25 years later.

It stinks but the local authorities seem powerless to stop the scam.

I have heard of these "pay to get onto the rank" schemes before.

BR don't do it everywhere (not in London or Liverpool, that's
certain), but it always causes bad feeling when they di it.

Whether it's done presumably depends on the presence of railway-owned land.
Did they do it at London termini in the days when taxi ranks were between
the platforms? Isn't it done at Heathrow?

--
Colin Rosenstiel