The ShiteDrivers.com web site was recently featured (week before last) in the Dundalk Democrat – taking up the whole front page of the “Take 2″ section of the paper. Have had a problem with my scanner, but as soon as it’s working, I’ll put the article up on the Media page.
Also… today, I’ll be speaking on The Last Word (at about 4.30pm) on 100-102 Today FM about taxis and what ShiteDrivers.com’s users think of them. Also speaking at the same time will be Tommy Gorman of the National Taxi Drivers Union.
I know it’s short notice but if anyone has anything they’d like me to say or ask while on the Last Word, post a comment here now!
Here’s the discussion. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a word in once Tommy Gorman started speaking. Feel free to comment:-
[audio:071114-TodayFM-MattCooper.mp3]
4 Comments
Enjoy the talk and congrats on the feature
I personally knew about this site after reading an old Metro (Dated June 12 2007 i think) when there was a "in brief" article about shitedrivers.com being praised by the RSA
Personally I'll be just echoing what other users have already said here: http://shitedrivers.com/index.php/2007/09/21/are-taxi-drivers-professional-drivers/
Though once i had a taxi driver picking me up at 1am from the airport and drove at M1 at some bizarre 50km/h when the limit was like 100km (correct me if i am wrong) and there was barely any other car on the road.
00:10 "There were only 145 complaints made to the Taxi Regulators [TR]"
I wouldn't be surprised if the figure were much higher than that in reality [e.g. the number of dissatisfied taxi customers] mainly because many of them doesn't know/can't be arsed to look up the number to contact the TR to forward their complaint. I personally had 5 "dissatisfactions" against Taxi drivers but none of them weren't logged to the TR mainly because we obtained the taxies from out local cab and whenever we have complaint we would just bring it there instead of going to the TR.
Also – lately when i travelled between Ireland and UK I would once in a while hear tourists complaining about the Taxi drivers [being late for pick up, Shite Driving etc] in Dublin Airport.
01:23 "Only 32 people voted for Taxi Drivers"
That works out to be approx 31% which I would pretty much confidently conclude even if "thousands" of people voted on the same vote – 30-ish % would agree that Taxi driver be the worst offenders on the Roads.
04:02 "You don't have to have a fare-paying passenger to use the bus-lane"
Fair enough – I do see that sometimes it is necessary to use the bus lane in order to arrive at the pick up elsewhere but personally I have seen numerous times that there are taxis who are not carrying fare-paying passenger as well as not rushing to get to the pick up [the "roof sign" was lit - i Do believe this means that the taxi is free to be "hand-waved" by a pedestrian and pick them up - correct me if i am wrong] and are just using this rule as a loophole to use the BUSlane
That reminded me of a case years ago on Navan Road [Dublin] where the Bus38 I was riding on almost slammed into the back of the taxi because it used the buslane the slowed down to pick up a person at the pavement who hand-waved at it.
Other than that it was a good talk – Enjoyed it – thanks for posting!
You sounded very well on it. You got your point across about the polls here & most importantly you got a plug in for the site!
Nice one! 
Well, Rubycored, as regards the bus lane thing – when Tommy Gorman made that point, I tried to get back in to reply to him that it's all well and good if it's actually legal to use the bus lane, but we all know the speed some of the taxis go down those lanes at, and those speeds often far exceed those of the people in the regular lane(s) and exceed the speed limit – which IS illegal – which was my original point. As I said though, unfortunately, once Tommy Gorman got going, I didn't get a chance to get a word of reply in edge-ways…
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[...] I was on the radio again today – on Today FM’s “Last Word”, talking about taxis with Matt Cooper and Tommy Gorman of the National Taxi Drivers Union. [...]