By the Numbers: Potential D.C. Taxi Drivers' Strike

| Print Post This | Like (0) | Comments (0)

IT'S STILL UNCLEAR how many of the city's cab drivers will stay off the streets on Wednesday as part of a 24-hour strike to protest Mayor Adrian Fenty's decision to switch from zones to meters, The Post's Sue Anne Pressley Montes reports. Nonetheless, businesses and residents are steeling up for potential transportation trouble on Halloween, one of the busier nights of the year for the city's cab fleet.

Let's look at the situation by the numbers:

» 7,500: The number of cab drivers who serve the District. Strike organizers say more than half will participate in the strike, but those number are difficult to verify because cab drivers are represented by several organizations.

» 12: The number of hours the last cab drivers' strike lasted. It occurred on Nov. 17, 2004, in response to legislation to rework taxi regulations proposed by then-Mayor Anthony Williams. During that strike, drivers took to the streets, but refused to pick up passengers.

» 900: The size of the membership rolls for the Ethiopian Ethio-American United Cab Owner Association. Wegen Tadesse told The Post that the group plans to participate in the strike.

» 3,750: The number of cab drivers who would be left to serve the District even if half of the city's cabbies decided to participate in the strike. That's more than the number of drivers working a normal day in Boston, which has 1,825 licensed drivers, San Francisco, with 1,381 drivers, or Denver, with 842 drivers, Montes reports.

» 800-200-TAXI: The phone number for SoberRide, a program that provides free cab rides on Halloween. Kurt Gregory Erickson, president of the Washington Regional Alcohol Program, said the service will be available despite the strike. It'll operate from 8 p.m. Wednesday through 4 a.m. Thursday.

Photo by Michael Williamson/The Washington Post