London taxis, with their friendly drivers who actually know where they are going, are ranked best in the world, according to an annual poll of travelers.
The survey by travel Web site hotels.com found London taxis, despite being the most expensive, beat rivals across the globe to head the list for the third consecutive years, scoring a total of 59 percent in votes on several categories.
London taxi drivers were voted both friendliest and most knowledgeable. Drivers in the English capital must pass a rigorous examination called The Knowledge to earn their taxi licence.
New York’s yellow taxis came second in the list, scoring 27 percent, which was up 10 percentage points from last year even though Manhattan’s cab drivers tied with Parisian taxi drivers as the rudest.
Travelers said New York had the most available taxis.
Cabbies in Rome were voted the worst drivers in the world with almost one in 10 travelers thinking the Italian capital had the world’s worst taxi drivers when it came to the quality of driving.
“Traveling by taxi is one of the first experiences that many travelers have upon arrival in a new city. In fact, the research found that cabs are by far the most popular method of traveling from the airport to their hotel,” a spokesman for hotels.com said in a statement.
The global poll scored city based taxis for their levels of cleanliness, value, quality of driving, knowledge of the area, friendliness, safety and availability.
Rounding out the top five were Tokyo with a total score of 26 percent, Berlin with 17 percent, and Bangkok scoring 14 percent.
Madrid’s taxis were ranked sixth in the poll, followed by Copenhagen and Dublin with 11 percent and Frankfurt and Paris with 10 percent. Syndey’s cabs scored badly in the area of value for money, availability and knowledge.
The survey for hotels.com was conducted among over 1,900 travelers between May 11 and May 28.
In the sweltering streets of Jakarta, buskers carry towering, hollow puppets and pass around a bucket for donations. Now, they fear becoming outlaws. City authorities said they would crack down on use of the sacred ondel-ondel puppets, which can stand as tall as a truck, and they are drafting legislation to remove what they view as a street nuisance. Performances featuring the puppets — originally used by Jakarta’s Betawi people to ward off evil spirits — would be allowed only at set events. The ban could leave many ondel-ondel buskers in Jakarta jobless. “I am confused and anxious. I fear getting raided or even
Eleven people, including a former minister, were arrested in Serbia on Friday over a train station disaster in which 16 people died. The concrete canopy of the newly renovated station in the northern city of Novi Sad collapsed on Nov. 1, 2024 in a disaster widely blamed on corruption and poor oversight. It sparked a wave of student-led protests and led to the resignation of then-Serbian prime minister Milos Vucevic and the fall of his government. The public prosecutor’s office in Novi Sad opened an investigation into the accident and deaths. In February, the public prosecutor’s office for organized crime opened another probe into
RISING RACISM: A Japanese group called on China to assure safety in the country, while the Chinese embassy in Tokyo urged action against a ‘surge in xenophobia’ A Japanese woman living in China was attacked and injured by a man in a subway station in Suzhou, China, Japanese media said, hours after two Chinese men were seriously injured in violence in Tokyo. The attacks on Thursday raised concern about xenophobic sentiment in China and Japan that have been blamed for assaults in both countries. It was the third attack involving Japanese living in China since last year. In the two previous cases in China, Chinese authorities have insisted they were isolated incidents. Japanese broadcaster NHK did not identify the woman injured in Suzhou by name, but, citing the Japanese
RESTRUCTURE: Myanmar’s military has ended emergency rule and announced plans for elections in December, but critics said the move aims to entrench junta control Myanmar’s military government announced on Thursday that it was ending the state of emergency declared after it seized power in 2021 and would restructure administrative bodies to prepare for the new election at the end of the year. However, the polls planned for an unspecified date in December face serious obstacles, including a civil war raging over most of the country and pledges by opponents of the military rule to derail the election because they believe it can be neither free nor fair. Under the restructuring, Myanmar’s junta chief Min Aung Hlaing is giving up two posts, but would stay at the
RSS