[nagdu] New city TLC cab policy blind to needs of disabled

[Ginger Kutsch]

New city TLC cab policy blind to needs of disabled 
Published: Sunday, December 05, 2010, 5:53 AM     Updated:
Sunday, December 05, 2010, 6:01 AM
 Jeff Harrell 
 
<http://blog.silive.com/around_the_block_column/2010/12/new_city_
tlc_cab_policy_blind_to_needs_of_disabled.html>
http://blog.silive.com/around_the_block_column/2010/12/new_city_t
lc_cab_policy_blind_to_needs_of_disabled.html
 
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- It's tough enough getting to a cab outside
the St. George Ferry Terminal with your health fully intact. 
 
 
 
Staten Island Advance/Hilton FloresLivery cabs not under contract
with the city line up on Richmond Terrace, waiting for ferry
commuters. 
 
Just making your way into and out of the terminal involves
following a convoluted path filled with cones, barrel barriers
and signs telling you to go there, turn here, and oh well ... too
bad if you end up at a dead-end. 
 
None of the signs wishes you luck if you're disabled and have a
special arrangement with a cab company that isn't one of the
city's Chosen Four allowed to pick up and drop off commuters on
the Ferry Terminal's property anymore. 
 
Just ask Dana Avant. 
 
Dana is blind and totally dependent on his new guide dog to get
around on foot, a black Lab named Aidan he just partnered with
two weeks ago. 
 
When Dana needs a ride from the ferry to his apartment in Fox
Hills, the 62-year-old retired child welfare social worker calls
ahead to Grant City Car Service to be there waiting when he gets
off the boat. 
 
"I use Grant City all the time, and they're very nice, very
courteous," Dana says. "They say, 'Call us when you're on the
boat and we'll be waiting for you.'" 
 
Last Friday when Dana got off the boat, Grant City couldn't make
it. 
 
"They told me they were no longer allowed to come into the
terminal," Dana recalls. 
 
Instead, the cab sat out on Richmond Terrace - a hike, several
skips and numerous jumps from the terminal for even the heartiest
of commuters with 20/20 vision. 
 

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Staten Island Advance/Irving SilversteinDana Avant, ouside his
home in Fox Hills with his service dog. He's blind and having
trouble with taxis not being allowed on ferry termnal property.
(Staten Island Advance/Irving Silverstein)
"How in the hell am I going to know where that is if I can't
see?" Dana asks, still exasperated at the lunacy of the
situation. "I couldn't get out there if I had to ... and I had
to." 
 
Standing blind in a panic with Aidan by his side, Dana received
assistance from a passerby who helped him flag down a cab. 
 
The following Monday, Dana phoned the non-emergency 311 number to
complain. What he dialed into was a bureaucratic circle of
goofiness that made the Ferry Terminal's parking lot look like a
straight answer. 
 
The 311 operator told Dana to call DOT or TLC, the city's Taxi &
Limousine Commission. 
 
"They gave me the service number at the Ferry Terminal," Dana
says. 
 
Dana thanked the phone reps for playing pass the buck and called
the Ferry Terminal. 
 
The man who picked up assured Dana the honchos in charge were
doing everything to make the Terminal accessible for the blind,
including the installation of Braille directional signs
designated by "chirping birds." Dana was told to keep his ears
peeled for the chirping birds. 
 
"I never heard any chirping birds," Dana says. 
 
Then, the terminal guy got terminally chirpy with Dana. 
 
"He said, 'We have nothing to do with this. Try TLC. They're the
ones that made the ruling.'" 
 
Dana's snicker over going 'round and 'round for a ride home by a
cab company he deals with regularly is worth a thousand chirps. 
 
"I don't know what bureaucrat thought this up," Dana says. 
 
This, meaning, the city's contract that only allows taxis from
four companies - Clove Lakes, Island Wide, DeJoy's and Newport -
near the ferry ramp. 
 
All other car services, including Grant City Car Service,
Access-A-Ride Taxi and others that accommodate the disabled, are
prohibited from driving on the ferry ramp because the city's
contract forbids outside competition from picking up fares on
terminal property. 
 
"It's a public place," insists a lone United Cabs cabbie parked
on Richmond Terrace Tuesday afternoon waiting in vain for anybody
to hoof it out to the street through a drizzling rain looking for
a ride. "Why do you have a private contract that keeps us out?" 
 
Allan J. Fromberg, TLC's deputy commissioner of public
information, says the contract keeps "gypsy cabs" from converging
on people during the terminal's rush hours and transporting them
in vehicles that are unlicensed, uninsured, uninspected and
driven by cabbies who have not been drug-tested. 
 
"It was like the wild, wild west," Fromberg says of the taxi
free-for-all at the terminal prior to the contract. 
 
Since prohibiting cab companies from picking up pre-arranged
disabled passengers at a convenient spot outside the terminal
borders on the absurd, Fromberg says MTA is compiling a list of
"black car services" not stipulated in the contract that would be
allowed to pick up and drop off on the property. 
 
A DOT spokeswoman says those cabs, which would be marked to let
the terminal's enforcement personnel know they are "legit," will
be able to pick up and drop off passengers at a designated area
"at the former taxi drop-off/pickup ramp." 
 
"We're going to make sure there's a place they can do it,"
Fromberg says. "We just have to dot the I's and cross the T's. We
have an obligation to make sure that the car they hop into is
insured, inspected and safe." 
 
That's fine with Dana, as long as he and his guide dog don't have
to feel their way out to Richmond Terrace to hunt down a ride
home. 
 
"Suppose somebody has orthopedic or mobility problems," Dana
asks. "This could disenfranchise the disabled community." 
 
Even a blind man can see that.