Cab Ranks are useful for both taxi drivers and passengers. NSW taxi drivers aren’t allowed to park their cabs wherever they like, so taxi ranks are supposed to allow drivers to stop driving and consuming fuel while they’re looking for their next fare.
They are also supposed to provide passengers with a more reliable way of finding cabs than hailing at the side of the road. Taxi stands are also generally a safer place to wait for a cab.
The trouble is:
most passengers don’t know where the taxi ranks are
Because passengers don’t know where the taxi ranks are, drivers will often sit at a rank for an hour or more, while just 50m up the road, there are passengers trying in vain to hail cabs.
What we need is a simple, mobile way for passengers to find cab ranks, regardless of where they are.
Unfortunately, there is no central list of all taxi ranks available anywhere on the web.
There is a list of about 50 secure taxi ranks – those patrolled by security guards – provided by NSW Dept of Transport here: http://www.transport.nsw.gov.au/taxi/secure-taxi-ranks.html.
In order to make this list more user-friendly, especially on a mobile phone, I’ve created a Google map of all the secure taxi ranks below…
View NSW Secure Taxi Ranks in a larger map
I suspect this list is more political point-scoring than it is useful for passengers. After all, as a passengers, you’re not usually looking for the most secure taxi rank. You are looking for the nearest taxi rank. If you had a choice between ranks, I’m sure many people would choose the one that is patrolled at night, but most people can’t find one, let alone a secure one.
Maybe we can find a way to fill in the gaps in this map, and produce a real resource for taxi drivers and passengers.