2023-09-30 20:59:03
Rome struggling with the lack of taxis. Endless queues of tourists and citizens looking for a white car at the Termini station in Rome and beyond are now a daily occurrence. And protests are mounting in chat rooms, on social media, in neighborhood groups. The discomfort also affects VIPs who, interviewed by time.news, expressed their disappointment and frustration.
Pippo Baudo: “There is a dictatorship of taxi drivers”
“A situation unworthy of a European capital and one of the most famous and visited cities in the world.” Pippo Baudo, interviewed by time.news, joins the growing protest of Romans, tourists and VIPs over the poor level of taxi service in Rome. “There is a real dictatorship of taxi drivers – accuses the popular Catania host who lives in Rome – They want to be the absolute rulers of the city! They don’t come by, they don’t answer the phone with the call centers that look like ghosts, to be sure of you have to call a taxi at least two hours in advance, there are few of them and few of them want to stay. Truly an intolerable situation”, concludes Pippo Baudo.
Barillari: “After an endless wait at Termini I took photos”
“Tragic situation, with people increasingly angry and with lots of tourists with whom we make a fool of ourselves as a capital…”. Rino Barillari, the ‘king of the paparazzi’ interviewed by time.news, does not mince words when ‘photographing’ the level of taxi service in Rome. “The last example is enough: the other time I was at Termini, there were hundreds of people waiting and I’m not exaggerating. In the end, after an hour and a quarter had passed, I left the queue, I gave up on taking the taxi and I started taking photos: the only thing I could do…”, says the famous Roman photographer. “Now it’s become difficult to even call a taxi: you stay there for half an hour listening to the music and the answering machine and then the call cuts off and you stay there like a… oh well, I don’t want to say any more bad words! – Barillari is ‘self-censoring’ – And then, they take a long time to arrive even when the taxi rank is close, they take the wrong route on purpose to take longer itineraries and make the taximeter run. Thus, it is inevitable that the streets of Rome become filled with people who even ride two or three on a scooter…”.
Pingitore: “Returning home is a puzzle”
“A tragicomedy, but more tragedy than comedy, the taxi situation in Rome”. This is the definition given by the director Pier Francesco Pingitore, the writer and director patron of ‘Bagaglino’, who in an interview with time.news observed: “In the capital there have always been many residents, well over two million; the tourists are always very many; and yet , until a few months ago, despite some inconvenience, taking a taxi wasn’t an odyssey. Evidently, with the heat, taxi drivers also ‘melted away’…”, he jokes, using the double meaning of the verb, understood as ‘melt in the sun’ but also like ‘melt away’.
“I’ve always taken a taxi, but today I have to endure endless and often useless waits, because after waiting a long time they tell you that there are no taxis available in the area – protests Pingitore -. It’s hard to understand what really happened And then, going home at night becomes a risk, a puzzle: if you manage to take a taxi in the evening to go to the theater or to a restaurant, it doesn’t mean that you will be able to find one after the show or dinner is over to take you back to home. And what do we do? Do we go back on foot?”. Who knows what Pasquino would write today… “Yes: it will mean that I will make him speak in my next book”, comments Pingitore.
Ghini: “Terms like Lampedusa”
Rome’s Termini Station like Lampedusa. Massimo Ghini, interviewed by time.news, compares the two realities to represent the strong inconvenience, due to the lack of taxis, that tourists have to face as soon as they arrive in the city. Different realities, of course, but which according to the actor who “does not want to seem offensive” present points of contact. “It is as if we found ourselves – he says – in front of two ‘Lampeduse’: on the one hand that of the poor unfortunates, who come from Africa, and on the other that of the tourists, who come to bring us money, but who they remain waiting for someone to hold out their hand. I live near Termini Station – says Ghini – but it seems like being in Lampedusa. And the hoteliers? And the restaurateurs? And the traders? Why don’t they raise their voices?”, asks Ghini according to which the problem can only be resolved if “politics agrees to seriously address this problem. It is a tug of war between a category and politics which has an interest in keeping taxi drivers happy because they are a source of votes”.
Having said this, Ghini agrees with the fact that “new licenses are needed, we need to make taxis work 24 hours a day. But it is clear that they must be put in a position to have assistance. In Rome the only oil we have is tourism, we we are not Milan or Turin” says Ghini recalling that “in two years there will be the Jubilee in Rome”. For this reason “politics must intervene heavily”. Moving on from general considerations to daily experience, Ghini says: “Tonight I have to go to dinner in a restaurant located in a side street of Via del Corso and I’m asking myself the problem of how I’ll get back home. I hope that someone will help me accompany me on the scooter.” “When I go to Paris, Madrid, London or Berlin – he states – if I raise my arm in the street a taxi stops. And here we are still discussing this problem that arose with the issue of licenses. I understand that for a taxi driver the license it is an investment that is made in one’s life and old age.” But, Ghini asks, “if taxis are public cars, why is the sale of licenses private?”.
Montesano: “The municipality must solve the problem”
“I only get around by taxi and on some occasions I found myself truly desperate, I called two or three companies and there were no cars available. A city like Rome, which lives on tourism, shouldn’t have this problem. It’s counterproductive for a city with a purely tourist vocation like ours”. The popular actor Enrico Montesano, a true Roman and a great user of the capital’s taxi service, said this to time.news. “I learned from Garinei, my old teacher – explains Montesano – Who said: I can even go somewhere by car, but then where do I park? So I go directly by taxi”. Montesano is keen to point out that he is not angry with taxi drivers: “I am a friend of taxi drivers, I talk to them, I don’t think it is their fault, but the municipality of Rome must take the situation into its own hands and solve the problem”, concludes the actor.
Nancy Brilli vents: “They can’t be found, it’s absurd”
“It’s an absurd and incomprehensible situation. Recently I waited for over forty minutes for a taxi, because I had no other way to go to the centre, often they don’t even answer. But what happened?”. It is the outburst that the actress Nancy Brilli entrusts to time.news, complaining about the difficulty in finding a taxi in Rome. After posting an ironic photo in her Instagram stories in which she is ‘waiting for a taxi’ in slippers after taking off her heels, as evidence of the long wait, Brilli explains on the phone: “After Covid I chose not to take the car anymore and to only go by taxi. It seems that is no longer possible. I had a subscription to radio taxi, I also liked it a lot, they provided a useful service, they even waited for you to enter the house…then what happened? Where did the taxi in Rome?”.
The actress joins the long list of VIPs who live in Rome and find themselves facing difficulties in getting around the capital by taxi. From Parietti to Montesano, from Luca Argentero to Max Giusti, from chef Antonello Colonna to stylist Guillermo Mariotto, in recent weeks many well-known people have complained about the shortcomings of service in the city. “It happened that they didn’t answer, that they refused to take me to the requested place – adds Nancy Brilli – or that, when I asked them to take me to Piazza di Spagna, they asked me: Piazza di Spagna where? Near what? In short, it’s a disastrous situation,” concludes the actress.
Alba Parietti: “The situation in the city is a tragedy”
“The taxi situation in Rome is a delusion. I regularly queue for at least an hour and a half at the station, madness.” Speaking to time.news is Alba Parietti, who complains – like many Roman citizens in recent months – about the lack of taxi service in the capital. “It’s not just a problem, it’s a real tragedy for those who have to travel – underlines the presenter – they don’t answer for hours if you try to call them and they no longer take reservations. The service no longer represents a guarantee”. “I often speak with taxi drivers, and according to them the problem arose from the lack of public services, buses, the metro – explains Parietti – I don’t know if this is the point of the issue because it’s not my job, but I can say what happens to me every day: it’s a disaster.”
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