Last summer the Chronicle reported the row at the railway station over the use of the taxi rank on the city side.
For decades it had been used by the hackney carriage drivers before the right to park was transferred to Wintax. The issue was that hackney carriages can be 'hailed in the street', passengers just get into the vehicle and away you go. Wintax vehicles have to be pre-booked, these days via smartphones and apps. The hackney cabs were pushed away from the forecourt further up Station Road to a shorter rank.
Some people, probably young people, might say 'so what?' But it caused confusion for many, especially as there little if any public consultation. Old people and the disabled are much less likely to have smartphones and to be familiar with how modern booking work. For the disabled the hackney rank was further away from the station.
READ MORE HERE: Hackney drivers return to prime rank outside station
So we welcome the news that South Western Railway has backtracked and handed the forecourt back to the hackney cabs. This how it should be. Change is not always good and in this case the previous set-up worked well.
The hackney drivers kicked up a fuss and the public reaction was such that South Western Railway felt it had to act. Whether financial reasons were a factor is unclear as that is confidential.
But as the spokesperson for Wintax refreshingly told us: "If they (the hackney drivers) are willing to put up this much of a fight we thought we should let them have it. They rely on picking up from the station and do not have the same luxury as we do as a company. We don’t need the train station, we are a very good and well-known company. With all the grief we have had it’s just not worth it.”
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