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City agrees to increase number of cabs
By Kelly Wilkinson
Sunnyvale residents should notice an increase in the number of cabs on city streets in the future: Since the beginning of the year, the City Council has given three new cab companies the right to operate in Sunnyvale, nearly doubling the number of companies working within the city limits.
At their May 11 meeting, councilmembers agreed to renew a franchise for the new owners of Express Cab USA. They also approved a fare increase.
"I think there could be even more," said West Valley Cab Company's Neil Sood. "The number of taxicabs [in Sunnyvale] was not enough, and the cab companies I see are still pretty busy. The demand is definitely there."
Sood said that taxi companies should expand even further. Under current municipal code, a cab driver from a Sunnyvale company can drop off passengers in another city but cannot pick up a second fare unless he is licensed in that city. For instance, if a cab driver licensed in Sunnyvale dropped off a passenger in Mountain View, he couldn't pick up a passenger there unless his company also operated a franchise in Mountain View.
"Once you start with one city, you need to expand because you can't pick up anywhere else," Sood said.
Aman Deep Singh, who in March started a Sunnyvale franchise of the Green Cab company, said his six or seven Sunnyvale cabs are very busy.
"We operate primarily in Milpitas and Fremont and have so many customers who go to Sunnyvale and like to take our cabs back from Sunnyvale also," Singh said. "We were losing too much business there because people do like our business and want to use us."
Singh said he feels that it does make a difference to people which cabs they use.
"It depends on the condition of the cabs and the cab drivers," he said. "If a company will give good service, people will like that."
Under municipal code, Sunnyvale does not place a limit on the number of taxi companies that can run out of the city. At present, there are eight Sunnyvale cab companies.
The council is obligated to grant an operating license to a company provided it meets the city's requirements. Those include proper insurance, a local business address, vehicles designated for Sunnyvale only and no criminal history. The franchise license is valid for two years, and individual drivers are required to obtain taxi driver's permits from the Public Safety Department.
Dave Vossbrink, community relations officer for Sunnyvale, said Public Safety handles the franchise requests because of the background checks required to approve an application.
Vossbrink also said that from time to time, councilmembers have asked whether there is enough demand to meet the increase in franchises.
"The short answer to that is, it's not our business. No one dictates the number of Chinese restaurants or Mexican restaurants there are," Vossbrink said. "From our perspective, they do use public streets and are a public transit mechanism."
The City Council also passed an 11 percent rate increase in March, moving the standard pickup charge from $1.80 to $2. Prior to that, rates had remained the same since January 1991. According to the city reports, Sunnyvale rates had become the lowest in the county, and the rate adjustment brought consistency between Sunnyvale and its neighboring cities.
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Sunnyvale, California Since 1994
