NYC Facts of Life: Getting a Taxi When It Starts to Rain

There is a musicale production called "Manhattan Towers" from the 1940's, in which, in explaining why they prefer NYC to Chicago, they say of the Windy City " But it hasn't go the roaring subway trains/ And you never find a taxi when it rains.."

Which is sort of ironic, I guess...Chicago DOES have some subway trains, but not like NYC does of course, and in fact in Chicago people call on the phone for cabs instead of trying to hail them..

As for what happens when it starts to rain, watch what happens here when a confident doorman tries to get a cab on taxi-rich Second Avenue--just as a light rain begins to fall

Which of course, brings us to the whole system by which cabs are licensed for use on NYC's streets...this has always been done by a system called "medallions," which can be owned by individuals or by cab companies...

I don't know who invented this system but it now gets competition from cruising limos ( which I still believe are operating illegally but are  the best  of the few real options for people in cab-poor areas, such as the Bronx)...

Well,  let's see what I can find out about Taxis in New York...  how this has all evolved and where it is heading.

Oh, by the way, you don't have to feel bad about the frustrated doorman...he will flag down a cab eventually, and even if he doesn't he will still get his terrific bonanza of tips at Christmas from the residents of the East Side apartment building where he works

Partially because a lot of these people he is hailing cabs for are perfectly capable of hailing cabs for themselves but are enjoying the little luxury of having the doorman do it for them..just after I left this corner, I saw another doorman with a little umbrella shepherding a not-very-old businessman into a cab...I  mean, the businessman was no doddering old lady with a small Asian dog or something ( down in Murray Hill, you see many older women hailing cabs for themselves, standing determinedly out in the street, jaws clenched and stuck out, arms often upraised like they were giving the Hitler salute...holding this pose for endless periods...)

You know what, I am going to make the article on the Taxi and Limousine situation a separate posting, because what I find on the internet may be pretty longwinded.