News - Is this taxi USB 3 enabled?

[HEXUS]

New York's Taxi of Tomorrow.

Read more.

[watercooled]

I've been configuring a kernel for the past few hours so here's a quick cool-down rant.

2 litre 25mpg petrol version...Ford Crown Victoria, at approximately 12mpg

How do they manage to get such poor efficiency from an engine?

Some people are of the opinion that the default taxi in New York being a van might hurt the image of New York and that could be right, it does seem to lack the cool factor, from the outside.

Yeah it's not exactly what I think of when someone says 'New York cab'. And is making vehicles even bigger a great idea in such an overcrowded city?

Another bonus is that there is an air purity filter to filter out noxious city fumes. It’s also the safest so far with side and front airbags and it has passed federal crash tests kitted out with all the standard fittings.

It's possible to travel fast enough to require airbags in NYC? It looks like they've borrowed a few ideas from our black cabs, with the flat floor and such. I didn't think there was anything wrong with the current cabs TBH, you don't get groundbreaking fuel efficiency with these so I don't see why they're bothering?

[Guy]

How do they manage to get such poor efficiency from an engine?

The figures quoted will be US MPG, which are lower.
25 MPG (US) = Around 30MPG over here, and 12 MPG (US) = Around 15.

Sounds about right. Remember the weight of the cars, plus the economy will be seriously hurt in City conditions, plus they are geared towards long life so they are relatively unstressed, and the current Crown Vics are V8 powered, hence the low MPG. Oh and the fact that the engine has been around for many many years!

I didn't think there was anything wrong with the current cabs TBH

Did you ever sit in them? For the size of them, roomy isn't a word I would use, plus the ride was erm 'interesting'.

[watercooled]

The figures quoted will be US MPG, which are lower.
25 MPG (US) = Around 30MPG over here, and 12 MPG (US) = Around 15.

Sounds about right. Remember the weight of the cars, plus the economy will be seriously hurt in City conditions, plus they are geared towards long life so they are relatively unstressed, and the current Crown Vics are V8 powered, hence the low MPG. Oh and the fact that the engine has been around for many many years!

Thanks for the clarification, I wasn't aware of a different measurement, but it's still not terribly impressive for a commercial vehicle IMHO. A UK bus probably manages greater than 15MPG. To be fair though, it's not that bad when you compare to a London Taxi considering it's petrol. I'd like to know why they didn't choose the diesel version though?

Did you ever sit in them? For the size of them, roomy isn't a word I would use, plus the ride was erm 'interesting'.

Quite fun, but yeah I suppose it could get annoying using them every day.

[Hoonigan]

What would you install in the Taxi of Tomorrow?

Pole dancers.

[Smudger]

Those Crown Victorias are huge barges, so I'm not surprised they get rubbish mileage. I remember seeing a program where they took a London cab out to New York, the NY cabbies couldn't believe the MPG, reliability, miles between services etc, and especially the turning circle. But they're not Yellow barges, so the public probably wouldn't have them...

[Guy]

Thanks for the clarification, I wasn't aware of a different measurement, but it's still not terribly impressive for a commercial vehicle IMHO. A UK bus probably manages greater than 15MPG. To be fair though, it's not that bad when you compare to a London Taxi considering it's petrol. I'd like to know why they didn't choose the diesel version though?


Quite fun, but yeah I suppose it could get annoying using them every day.

Hang on you're now switching to buses? Not exactly a like for like. Plus I can't imagine it would be close to that, I would say around 5-10MPG. Much like HGV's which have single digit MPG's.

I guess it's still largely a supply thing, I know Diesels have made headway over there, but availability of pumps, and trying to get the engines to pass regulations over there is interesting. BMW has finally got the 3 litre Twin blown Diesel over there, but to be able to sell it in all the States took a fair bit of work. You have to add in what is basically Ad-Blue every so often, to keep the emissions to an acceptable level.

Plus the American stereotype for diesels is laughable.

[watercooled]

I was showing the MPG of a US car is comparable to a European bus, I don't see anything wrong with that? And it's actually quite close to true. As I was saying, the new one isn't so horrendously bad, but only relatively speaking.

[cameronlite]

Urm... A Lamborghini Gallardo Coupe can average 20MPG in an urban environment...

[Spank]

Urm... A Lamborghini Gallardo Coupe can average 20MPG in an urban environment...

But does it have USB3?

[cameronlite]

But does it have USB3?

No. Lamborghini had a choice between a 5.6L engine or USB3 and a milk float engine.

Personally I'd have gone with the USB3!

[CK_1985]

A big part of why the fuel economy is so bad on the current cabs is the way they're driven - the cab drivers are shockingly bad and seem to think that there are only two pedal positions in a car: gas all the way to the floor, or brake all the way to the floor. That's a big part of why they wouldn't go for the diesel engine in the new one as well - perceived lack of performance/acceleration.

...Yeah it's not exactly what I think of when someone says 'New York cab'. And is making vehicles even bigger a great idea in such an overcrowded city?...

The new-style cabs actually have a smaller 'footprint' than the existing ones, since the current ones have that ridiculously long bonnet and massive boot space. That is part of their iconic look though, so it will kind of be a shame to see them go.

... There’s not one mention of entertainment/IT gadgetry (or any karaoke equipment) for the passengers...

Given that the current cabs all have screens in the back showing various news, entertainment and weather items on a loop (interspersed with ads, obviously), I'd be very surprised if the new ones didn't at least have the same. Also, the current cabs all have a much better system for paying by credit card than anything you get in the UK, which is actually really useful. It might just be that the press release doesn't mention these things because they're taken for granted, given that even the old cabs have them.

... They haven’t even committed to a hybrid power train, though they are going to test 6 Nissan Leaf cars as taxis this year.

I find this aspect of it totally crazy. I was in Boston recently and practically every cab was a hybrid. it just seems like a no-brainer when you consider how much time they spend doing less than 10 mph. The sooner they change them all to 'Leaf' models the better.

[Betty_Swallocks]

Why would you need entertainment/IT gadgetry in a cab? You're not going on a long journey. On most cab journeys by the time you've plugged your iPod in you're there.

[badass]

Thanks for the clarification, I wasn't aware of a different measurement, but it's still not terribly impressive for a commercial vehicle IMHO. A UK bus probably manages greater than 15MPG. To be fair though, it's not that bad when you compare to a London Taxi considering it's petrol. I'd like to know why they didn't choose the diesel version though?


Quite fun, but yeah I suppose it could get annoying using them every day.

Diesel is a lot more expensive than petrol in the states. There needs to be a much larger improvement in MPG to make it worthwhile.

Also, as mentioned earlier in this thread, US gallons are smaller than UK gallons. Finally, their EPA ratings for MPG use a different cycle to the European one.
IIRC a 60MPG car on our cycle with our gallons will get around 40MPG on the american one. Quite a difference!

[watercooled]

Diesel is a lot more expensive than petrol in the states. There needs to be a much larger improvement in MPG to make it worthwhile.

Yeah I thought that might have something to do with it.

[PowerPie5000]

it seems like they will be opting for the 2 litre 25mpg petrol version over the 1.5 litre diesel 53.3mpg version popular in the UK

Why would they bother going for the model with the bigger and far less economical engine?? If the UK can manage fine with the 1.5ltr version then surely so can the US? We even have a higher national speed limit (which will be increasing soon) and our cabs can cope fine with their smaller and more efficient engines. At least those big old V8 things are finally being replaced... A V8 in a city cab is a joke!

Diesel is a lot more expensive than petrol in the states. There needs to be a much larger improvement in MPG to make it worthwhile

Even for a cab that can do more than twice the amount of mileage than the petrol version?? I'm pretty sure diesel engines are also more environmentally friendly these days too... Not that many people care it seems.