The D.C. Council lifted the $19 cap on taxicab rides that start and end in the District, a limit installed to protect city residents east of the Anacostia River who live far from their jobs and many basic services.
D.C. cab drivers despise the cap and have called for its end since June 2008, when the zone fare system was replaced with time and distance meters. The council unanimously removed it as part of the fiscal 2010 budget plan, which takes effect Oct. 1.
The cap, said Ward 1 Councilman Jim Graham, is “very artificial, arbitrary and unfair.”
“The trip goes on and on and on, but the fare stops,” said Graham, who offered the amendment. “This would simply permit the cab operator to have the meter continue to run, so that they get fair compensation for their ride.”
The $19 cap was a remnant of the zone fare system. It was retained to protect the poorest D.C. residents, many of those from east of the river, where they must commute to downtown and beyond for their jobs or for basic needs like a hospital or supermarket.
Ward 8 Councilman Marion Barry initially opposed Graham’s amendment, arguing his constituents were “disadvantaged” because of the long, often slow drive across the river. But he later withdrew his opposition after he was told most D.C.-to-D.C. rides didn’t hit $19 unless traffic was very heavy.
“These cab drivers need to make more money,” Barry said. “They are valuable small-business people here. They’ve been beat up on with meters.”
Bihilinge Scedaf, a cab driver since 1972, told the D.C. Taxicab Commission earlier this year that the cap was “unfair.” Drivers say they should not have to take anyone “for nothing.”
“I had [a] passenger asking me to go to Chevy Chase on a rainy day,” Scedaf said, according to a transcript of the meeting. “He ask me to go through Rock Creek Parkway. By the time we get to Van Ness, the meter stopped.”
Lifting the cap may spur more drivers to take fares from Northwest to Southeast, said William Ellis, an advisory neighborhood commissioner from the Washington Highlands area.
“There’s only two reasons a cab won’t pick you up, either for money or for safety,” Ellis said. “Now that they can make their full wage, they’ll be more than willing to take you where ever you need to go.”
