Community Corner

City Launches Electric Taxi Program

However, some taxi drivers worry about the time it takes to charge the new vehicles

This article was written by Nathan Duke

The city will introduce six fully electric taxis into its fleet today as part of a pilot program to celebrate Earth Day, reported The New York Times

The six Nissan LEAF cabs, which will be put on the road today, run completely on electricity and never need to fill up at gas stations. The cabs can be fully recharged in less than 30 minutes and would reduce gas emissions by nearly 90,000 tons per year. 

Some yellow-taxi drivers express doubts about the electric taxi’s viability because of the time it takes to charge the vehicles. However, Taxi and Limousine Commissioner David Yassky feels in this case, environmental viability weighs out over time.

“New Yorkers are very environmentally conscious and [they] appreciate that in a city as congested as this one, air quality is always going to be a concern and anything you can do to reduce harmful emissions is a step in the right direction,”  Yassky told 1010 Wins. 

In his January 2013 state of the city address, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he’d like for one-third of the city’s 13,000 medallion taxis to be electric by 2020. For more information on the electric cabs, visit the TLC’s website.


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