Around 50 people were waiting this Thursday, loaded with suitcases, for a taxi to arrive at the stop, while the group of taxi drivers from other municipalities that is set up these days was in turn waiting for a call from the service controller to be able to pick them up. However, that call does not occur, as the controller himself acknowledged, until the queue reaches a considerable size. An attitude that neither taxi drivers nor passengers understand. Although it is not officially recognized, taxi drivers from other municipalities assure that the instruction is not to let them in until about 50 people are in the queue. And in fact, in the photos taken this Thursday, up to 44 people can be counted waiting for a taxi.
The problem is not new. It is repeated from time to time at the taxi rank of the airport terminal. On days of maximum flight arrivals, such as Thursdays and Sundays, the taxi service does not work in the most appropriate way to meet passenger demand. Tourists and residents are forced to remain in the queue until the service coordinator considers it appropriate to allow taxi drivers from outside the municipality of San Bartolomé to enter, but by then some customers have been in the queue for more than 20 minutes.
Aware of this problem, the Councilor for Transport of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, Ramón Bermúdez, understands that it is the Island Association of Taxis that must respond to these circumstances with a change in the organization of the service, not only at the airport, but also in the tourist municipalities. "Half an hour of images like yesterday's destroys all the promotion that is done of the island. What happens at the airport cannot continue to be allowed, it is necessary for the Association to consider changing certain rules that they established at the time both at the airport and in tourist areas and that have clearly become obsolete", says Bermúdez.
The councilor is even willing to take over the powers of the organization of the service. "If the Association passes us the powers, we would solve this problem in 4 days", but in any case, according to the head of transport on the island, the single management of the taxi through the Auriga system would alleviate these problems, "because ultimately it is about shortening waiting times for any citizen, tourist or resident, wherever they are". The entry into operation of the system is awaiting consideration of the allegations that have been presented by the taxi associations of the island.
