Good news is here for the commuters and smart phone users of New York city after its Taxi and Limousine Commission voted in favor of a one-year long taxi e-hailing test program earlier this week. During this test program, users will be able to hail and pay for the yellow cab rides using their smart phones.
According to Gigaom, users will be able to hail a taxi within a radius of half a mile in Manhattan below 59th street. The radius expands to around 1.5 miles for the rest of New York.
Experts say that the service will make the taxi experience much better for commuters and will also quickly find drivers more customers, saving them valuable on-duty time.
Companies like Uber are celebrating the move by the Commission. It launched its application in September, but was forced to stop it a month later after the Commission brought up the matter of an age-old agreement between the city's taxi cab and for-hire industries. The agreement stated that Yellow Cabs in the city cannot take prearranged rides. But thanks to the recent vote, the city's commuters will no longer have to struggle and wait for long periods to get a cab ride.
Besides Uber, other prominent players in the e-hailing test program include Hailo, GetTaxi and Taxi Magic. As far as payment is concerned, commuters can use credit cards from VeriFone and CMT.
The program is set to start during February next year and will hopefully add more convenience to New York's taxi experience.
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