I was at a mid-sized station in Tokyo this afternoon. There’s a taxi stand, but no taxis. I waited for about 15 minutes before giving up. And the app won’t let you call a taxi to the station…
Edit: For all the people who maybe don’t live in Japan pointing out it’s new years day, I’ve made this same trip on Jan 1 for 20 years. This is the first time taxis have been nowhere to be found.
11 comments
It’s New Year’s Day and no one’s out anywhere. Taxis will likely be fewer in numbers for the next few days.
Ouch 😓
That’s not what jumped the shark means
…..what do you think jumped the shark means?
Jump the shark (idiom):
(usually of television shows) to reach a point where something stops becoming more popular or starts to decrease in quality.
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/ja/dictionary/english/jump-the-shark
It is jan.1 my friend…😂
I talked to a taxi driver once and they said a lot of taxi drivers quit during corona virus so it’s difficult because they can’t keep up with the demand when everything reopened.
On the other hand, some of the taxi drivers in Kyoto & Okinawa are old assholes though who refuse to use their GPS and pick people up, so they have to be careful with customer service, because the same thing happened in California 13 years ago and everyone switched to Uber & Lyft which is the battle now in Japan.
There is a taxi driver shortage since end of Covid. All the drivers fired/quit during covid and never came back. But now the tourists are back in full force leading to a shortage of cabs. It use to be bad in the mornings but now it’s just bad all day.
Keep in mind it’s New Year’s Day.
Go around the corner, and use the Taxi Go app there.
There isn’t a lack of taxis, there is a huge number of passengers on new year’s eve and new year’s day.
It means the taxis will be out in force and earning overtime, but it also means people will have a hard time finding an empty one.
As more people decide to go out on new years to anywhere besides a temple, this situation is expanding.