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Taxi driving in Thunder Bay circa 1985: Don Taylor’s driving career gets started

Guest Contributor

I had always loved driving, and mom once told me the only car seat she could put me in where I wouldn’t cry was one with a steering wheel. I, of course, have no memory of this. I started driving taxi not thinking of it as a start to a trucking career. Instead, I just figured it would do until “something better comes along.”  It would be nine years of “making do” before I made the jump to being a full-time truck driver.

Before he was a writer, and before he was a Truck driver, Don Taylor earned his living as a Taxi driver at Roach’s Taxi in Thunder Bay.

My test drive with Roach’s was with one of their big commercial customers, mainly to see how I’d treat the vehicle on rough roads. The owner’s brother was the road tester, meaning, of course, that I was gentle with the car.

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Legalizing rideshare permitted more than 80,000 additional vehicles to cruise Toronto's already-gridlocked streets.
Opinion/ColumnRide Hailing newsTaxi industry news

Can Chow’s real numbers shatter the spell cast by John Tory’s magic words?

Rita Smith

No matter which figure you use, 50,000 or 80,000 cruising cars is a lot more than 5,500 Taxis ***** An astonishing thing happened at Toronto’s October 11th City Council Meeting. While considering mandating electric Taxis and Ubers in order to

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Central Taxi drivers Mohammed Dahir and Mohammad Omar provide services to Niagara's Taxi medical program, which has provided a boon to drivers and enormous savings to the Region. Photo: Central Taxi
NewsTaxi industry news

Niagara Region’s Taxi medical service saving $1,000 per trip over Ambulance use: EMS report

Rita Smith

Sending select passengers to hospital by Taxi rather than by ambulance is saving Niagara Region approximately $1000 per trip, Public Health Committee members heard at their July meeting. The Region is on track to save $200,000 in transportation expenses on an investment of only $10,000, a return on investment of 1900 per cent.

In the five months since the Taxi medical pilot has been operational, the average cost of a Taxi trip has been $15-20. According to Municipal Benchmarking Network Canada, Niagara EMS Operating Cost per Patient Transported by ambulance averaged $1,006 in 2018.

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