>THE TAXI WARS

The taxi business is one of the most regulated industries in Toronto. It is also one of the most convoluted and fractured. Up until spring, taxi drivers and owners were still at war. The drivers wanted to protect the city’s new Toronto Taxi Licence. That licence requires its owner to be one of the cab’s drivers. More than 400 have already been issued, and they will gradually replace the two former licence categories.

Drivers were in favour: by excising the middlemen (absentee plate owners and agents), they expected it would earn them more money. But plate owners were opposed, seeking to protect their investment.

Uber X changed all that. Just a year old this month, it has already outnumbered the city’s entire taxi fleet and gained 40 per cent of its daily rides. It’s draining everyone’s pockets — the drivers, who are losing some 30 per cent of their fares, and the plate owners, whose investments have plunged in value from around $250,000 for a standard plate a year ago to around $130,000 today. Drivers and owners called a truce to fight the common enemy: the uninsured, unlicensed, unregulated “bandit cabs.”

They have a point. While city taxi drivers have to follow 45 pages of city rules, Uber argues its “driver-partners” aren’t bound by any of them, since it’s a ride-sharing technology company, not a taxi brokerage. This summer, Superior Court Justice Sean Dunphy agreed with Uber, refusing the City of Toronto’s demand for an injunction on its operations. The city responded this month by proposing to rewrite its taxi rules to include “transportation network companies” like Uber first, and then create a whole new licensing category for them.

Many taxi drivers and brokerages saw this as the death knell of their business. This week, the city’s licensing and standards committee agreed — voting for the first part, but not the second.

BECK TAXI

Estimated annual revenue: $11 million Number of licensed cabs in Beck fleet: 2,000

Number of licensed drivers: 4,5005,000

Standard fare, set by the City of Toronto: $4.25 to start (today, likely to be reduced), then $0.25 per 143 metres and $0.25 for every 29 seconds of waiting time

Monthly fee to cab owners for dispatch service: $465

Cost of renting a cab for a driver: $80-120 per shift

Average number of daily cab orders: 20,000 Number of calls in 2014: 8.5 million Boundaries: City of Toronto

UBER

Estimated annual revenue: $2 billion, according to Reuters

Number of “driver-partners” in Toronto: 15,000

Standard fare: Base of $4.00, then $0.80 per kilometre and $0.18 a minute

Monthly fee for “connection” service: 20 per cent of fare Cost of using a car, as Uber X driver: $0 Cost of using own car: $0 Number of Uber X drivers ticketed for operating without taxi licence: 100-plus

Average number of daily Uber X trips in Toronto: 17,000

Boundaries: 326 cities in 60 countries

TORONTO’S TAXI BUSINESS

Number of licensed taxicabs: 5,161 Number of people in Toronto with taxi driver’s licence: around 10,000

Number of licensed brokerages in Toronto: 30

Percentage of plate owners who also drive their cab: 30

Number of taxi trips per day in Toronto in 2014: 65,000