I'm
not particularly fond of the JUTC (Jamaica Urban Transit Company) buses,
especially as they are so expensive.
Worse
now that news has surfaced suggesting that the JUTC is planning to raise fares back to JA$120
for adults by January 2016 as noted in the article “JUTC
fare returns to $120 in January”, published Friday, November 20, 2015, The Jamaica Observer.
So
I’m quite pleased to announce that order is coming to my main travel
alternative in Kingston, the Route Taxi. The ITA (Island Transport Authority)
has decided that they all need to get stripes as reported in the article “New
Colour-Code System Coming For Taxis”, Published Thursday December 10, 2015,
The Jamaica Gleaner.
The
stripes, which are 4 inches wide (what no metric??) is a new colour code that's
set to come into effect at the end of March 2016. There will be no grace period
and any Route or Hackney Taxi that doesn’t have the stripes will not be allowed
to renew their licenses during the 2016 licensing period, which runs from Monday
February 15th 2016 to Thursday March 31st 2016.
Specifically,
the following stripes will apply to the following Taxis:
1.
Black and White checkered stripes for
Route Taxis
2.
Black and Yellow checkered stripes for
Hackney Taxis
Good
to note here that Hackney Taxis are chartered Taxis; these stripes will make it
super easy to differentiate the two types of taxis, instead of flagging down
vehicles and wondering why they don’t wanna stop.
I'm
assuming that these stripes will also glow iridescently in the dark, allowing
anyone to identify them at night!! Best of all, it’ll prevent Taxis from
running as either route or Chartered; they have to choose one and stick to it.
Any
vehicle without stripes is an instant JA$30,000 fine as per the article “Transport
Ministry Clarifies New Road Traffic Fines”, published June 23, 2014 By
Chris Patterson, The Jamaica Gleaner.
Finally
some order is coming to the chaos that is Jamaica's Taxi system. Now if they
could also stipulate that they have built in GPS so that we can track their
location on Google Maps that would be great as well!!
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