Taxi war hits Madrid hard
Protests block city's main roads, railway stations and airport
GETTING to and around Madrid has been a nightmare this week as taxi drivers protesting against private car and driver regulations has literally sieged the city's main roads and transport hubs.
Monday was the worst day. Once Fitur tourism fair closed on Sunday, taxi drivers moved their protest from Ifema exhibition centre to the city centre.
On Monday, taxis blocked the Paseo de la Castellana - the main avenue crossing the capital from north to south - causing complete traffic chaos not only on the avenue by along adjoining roads, many of which lead to official government buildings and top company HQs.
Riot squad police units were forced to intervene and eventually freed the road that had become blocked around the Santiago Bernabeu football stadium and Plaza Colón. Madrid cabbies have been joined by drivers from other regions supporting the strike.
Protestors then moved on to block Calle Genova, the location of the PP party headquarters. Unions points at the party, which rules in the regional government, as the main culprit for the current situation as it has not yet come up with regional regulation that meets taxi driver's demands regarding car and driver hire (VTC licences in Spain).
Once again police broke up the protest - which as the Castellana one earlier on, had not been authorised by the town hall or regional government.
Protesting drivers then went on to Barajas airport.
In the afternoon protest marches were held along Calle Goya, one of the city's main shopping streets, and then at the Puerta del Sol square.
Taxi proposal rejected
A proposal made by taxi drivers was rejected on Tuesday by the regional government.
President Ángel Garrido said his government 'was not going to give in to threats and black- mail' in reference to the action being taken in the city by protestors.
Sr Garrido insisted the right to strike is not a licence to bring a city to a standstill or hold it at ransom.
Taxi drivers had proposed VTC licences were limited to bookings make at least one hour before pick-up, could only carry passengers above a minimum distance and were not allowed to park around town waiting for another customer to contract their services - effectively forcing them to return to the depot or home after every run.
Meanwhile in Barcelona, the regional government has approved new legislation that was favoured by striking taxi drivers last week and that led leading car-and-driver hire companies Cabify and Uber to announce they would be pulling out of Barcelona.
The new regional law establishes that VTC licences can only carry passengers that have booked at least 15 minutes before pick-up time.
Fact and figures
There are currently 65,973 taxi licences throughout Spain (vehicles) according to figures released by the ministry of transport. The number of VTC licences is five-times less.