Palma taxi drivers met yesterday with the councillor for Mobility, Antonio Deudero, to address various issues of concern to the sector, such as very low fares compared to other cities in Spain, mobility problems due to excessive traffic, the unregulated activity of VTCs and the shortage of driver exams.
On Tuesday the first meeting was held between the councillor and representatives of the cooperative Taxis Palma and the Emisora Unificada Radio Taxi. There they denounced that, according to a FACUA study comparing taxi fares in 52 cities, Palma ranks 42nd. "Palma is the only city that has not changed it's rates since the publication of this study," the taxi drivers said in a statement. Thus, for a one-kilometre journey, the most expensive city is San Sebastian, with 5.40 euros, compared to 3.15 in Palma. The national average is 3.75 euros.
The taxi drivers took advantage of the meeting with the councillor to warn that they are not in favour of the proposal to apply the service restriction in Platja de Palma, airport and port to 25 percent of the fleet. "It is a measure that is detrimental to the service, it harms the profitability of taxi drivers and is inconsistent with the Joint Service Area project. These restrictions allow a greater implementation of our competitors VTC and technological platforms," they reported.
The sector also criticised the fact that VTCs have been incorporated into mobility "without any administrative regularisation and in breach of current regulations". In fact, in August last year the Agrupación Empresarial del Taxi, Radio-Taxi Ciutat and Radio-Taxi Andratx commissioned an investigation by a firm of forensic detectives, in which it became clear "the non-compliance with the regulations of the vehicles for hire that provide this service". Despite sending the results to the Direcció General de Mobilitat and then to the Ajuntament de Palma, "we have not received any response. Right now there is no administration willing to apply regulations and conditions for this service", which, according to the sector, allows for "impunity".
Another of the problems suffered by taxis is the saturation of the roads due to excessive traffic, which "reduces the productivity of the sector by 35 percent" and a shortage of exams to obtain a taxi licence, which should be "four times a year". In the first month of Radio Taxi Palma's joint radio station, 125,692 services were provided.