Special cabbies struggle for business
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Beijing's 70 wheelchair accessible taxis say they make hardly any money, despite heavy demand from elderly and disabled citizens.
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Beijing taxi driver Yang Bo demonstrates how to use his wheelchair-accessible taxi yesterday. |
Yang Bo, 30, drove to Changping district yesterday with his fourth customer of the day. He has now run his wheelchair accessible taxi for one year as part of Shouqi Group, one of the biggest taxi companies in Beijing.
In his taxi sits a notebook that records the names of all his customers. Although at least 20 pages cover his trips between October and November alone, his income is substantially less impressive.
"Many of my colleagues are not willing to drive taxis for the disabled because most of our driving time is without passengers," he said.
According to Yang, the average monthly income of a standard taxi driver is 3,000 yuan. However, he can normally only make about 2,000 yuan.
"I remember a customer in Changping district, far away from downtown Beijing. She needed me to drive her from the center of Changping to the district hospital.
"The distance was no more than 5 km but I spent half an hour making the trek to her home. Of course, this was unpaid," he said.
Thirty-five of the city's wheelchair accessible taxis belong to the Shouqi Group, with another 35 owned by the Beiqi Taxi Company.
Among Shouqi's vehicles, 15 are Santana 3000s, another 15 come from Great Britain, and the remaining five are vans.
"Although Santana 3000s and British cars both have rotating seats, we still prefer the bigger ones," said a resident surnamed Duan whose father uses taxis regularly to make his trip to hospital.
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