Dubai

Tonymercury · Posted: Tue Jul 15, 2008 6:29 am

Taxi lines and gridlock in Dubai
July 14, 2008 - 6:39AM
If Dubai doesn't resolve its taxi shortage, Bala T.R. says he won't keep coming back.

''This is the worst city for taxis that I have seen,'' the 43-year-old chartered accountant from India said as he waited in the heat outside the City Centre Hotel. ''It gets worse each time I come.'' Once in a cab, he inched out into one of the desert emirate's traffic jams.

For a city building the world's tallest skyscraper, largest airport and biggest man-made islands, Dubai's public transport system is still less than ordinary, putting strain on its taxi fleet and roads. The first line of Dubai Metro, a $US4 billion light-rail system, won't open until September 2009.

Getting the transportation equation right will be key in Dubai's competition for investment and tourists with neighbours including Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates' largest member.

''So far, Dubai doesn't have any public transport system worth mentioning,'' said Eckart Woertz, chief economist at the Gulf Research Centre in Dubai. ''The way it is, traffic is a serious disadvantage for Dubai as a place to do business.''

Traffic costs the local economy about 4.6 billion dirhams ($US1.25 billion) a year in lost man-hours, according to Dubai's Roads Transport Authority. Sixty-one percent of the congestion is because of the lack of alternatives, the authority said.

Still, it will be a challenge to dislodge people from their cars when the metro opens, said Blair Hagkull, managing director for the Middle East and North Africa at real estate consulting firm Jones Lang LaSalle. Gas sells for the equivalent of $US1.70 a gallon and summer temperatures soar above 40 degrees Celsius.

'Not a Panacea'

''The metro is not a panacea,'' said Hagkull, who's based in Dubai. ''It will be the catalyst.''

The traffic headaches are growing pains and not insurmountable, he said. The economy of Dubai, which has expanded from its historic centre down a strip of the Persian Gulf coast, grew 20% a year in the five years through 2006.

On the surface, Dubai is well served by taxis when compared to other metropolises. About 6900 taxis serve Dubai's population of about 1.4 million. That's 4.9 cabs per 1000 people, compared with 1.6 in New York, 2.7 in London and 4.7 in Tokyo, according to a survey by Bloomberg News.

'Too Much Traffic'

It's the gridlock and lack of public transport - the city's bus service counts 500 coaches - that make the search for taxis nightmarish for residents and the more than 6 million business travellers and tourists who visit Dubai annually.

In addition to its iconic black cabs, London, by contrast, has a fleet of 8000 buses. At peak hours, 522 Underground trains run at the same time, according to Transport for London.

''There is just too much traffic,'' said Azimullah Azizullah, managing director of Clever Transport Dubai, a shipping company. Waiting at a stand in the Al Ghurair Centre shopping mall in Deira, an older neighbourhood, Azizullah said he hoped to get a taxi within a half hour. Out on the street, he said he'd expect to wait two hours.

Bala, who visits Dubai about four times a year from Chennai, India, put his average taxi wait at an hour, though he lucked out at the City Centre Hotel and got one in half that time.

''It feels as if you are being punished,'' he said. ''Dubai has a high standard of living, but the quality of life is very poor.''

Legalizing Ridesharing

Dubai has started initiatives to ease congestion. The government this year decided to allow carpooling. Four people will be able to share a ride, provided the driver registers his car and the names of those it will carry. Until now, ridesharing was punishable with a fine of as much as 5000 dirhams to discourage illegal taxi services.

The transport authority will spend 52.5 billion dirhams over five years to expand bus, road and rail networks, Chairman Mattar al-Tayer said March 31. By the end of this year, the city will increase the number of public buses to 1200 and add 800 taxis, the agency said.

''That should help ease the problem,'' said Abdul Aziz Malik, chief executive officer of Dubai Taxi, one of seven companies that operate cabs in the city.

In the meantime, taxi queues are bringing out the worst in people. Jim Cawley, a 27-year-old from London working in Dubai for three months, says he's no longer surprised when people cut in line or fight for taxis.

''You have to be slightly cutthroat about these things,'' he said 25 minutes into a taxi line outside the Dubai International Financial Centre, a tax-free business park where banks including Goldman Sachs have offices. The DIFC started a limousine service for tenants after complaints about taxi waits.

Elizabeth Biggs, an associate director at headhunting consulting firm CharterHouse, said that three times a week she wastes more than half an hour hailing taxis on Bank Street in Bur Dubai, where many of her clients work.

''It's the worst place to find a taxi,'' she said. ''There is no parking there so you just have to take a cab and then you have to fight with people to get one.''

Bloomberg

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