Finally a ‘brake’: City Council approves taxi relief package after years of turmoil

[djohnslaw]

Originally Posted by BBMW

Just eliminate the medallion system entirely. License a limited number of drivers annually based on an annual dutch auction system. The license would be good for one year, and non-transferable. To drive any kind of open market for hire passenger vehicle (think taxi, ride share, black car, limo, etc.), the driver would need this license

There would be rules about the cars themselves, but there would not be a limited number of them.

exactly this.
but bailing out people who made a bad investment is absurd.

[djohnslaw]

Originally Posted by BBMW

The lenders and the brokers turned the medallion market into something akin to a Ponzi scheme. There was never any way a cab with a medallion on it could generate enough cash to pay the loans the banks were issuing and the banks knew it. The only way to keep the system afloat was to keep artificially inflating the prices of the medallions, lending the owners more money on them, which they'd use to pay the loans. And this worked until the rideshare companies collapsed the cabbies cash flow and the value of the medallions.

nobody put a gun to anybody's head.
the medallion system never made sense, but people made bad investments. the world changed and the taxi industry in nyc didn't. this is the result.

[Aeran]

Hundreds of Taxi Medallions Repossessed Despite Rescue Deal That Ended Hunger Strike

https://www.thecity.nyc/economy/2022...-hunger-strike

Mohammed Motaleb had just pulled his 2012 Toyota Prius out of the JFK Airport taxi lot last month when he noticed a Ford Crown Victoria tailing him.

“They followed me honking, honking, honking, like it was a police car,” is how he described the January 16 encounter with a man who he said tried to seize the taxi medallion he has owned since 2009. “They stalked me like 200 meters.”

The airport run-in ended, Motaleb said, with him calling police after the other driver blocked his yellow taxi and attempted to repossess the once-coveted metal plate that authorizes drivers to pick up street hails.

A Port Authority spokesperson confirmed that police officers responded to the dispute between “a medallion driver and a repo company employee,” but said they did not become involved because it was not a criminal matter.

“I said, ‘You cannot take my medallion,’” Motaleb told THE CITY. “I said, ‘If you have the legal authority, you can show me,’ and he did not show me.”

Less than three weeks later, the Bangladeshi immigrant received a letter from a law firm informing him that his medallion will be sold at a private sale on or after February 18 “to enforce the rights of OSK,” a Minnesota-based lender that has approximately 400 medallions, according to the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission.

The encounters highlight the continued pressures facing taxi medallion owners — even after many celebrated the city’s November commitment to guarantee medallion loans. The pledge ended a hunger strike and is designed to ease the devastating financial burden on many in the industry through lower monthly payments.

[mathjak107]

Originally Posted by djohnslaw

exactly this.
but bailing out people who made a bad investment is absurd.

Exactly .

Look at all the mom and pop video stores that were pushed out by blockbuster ..where is their bail out ?

Or those who bought photomats only to have digital have them go out of business