Coquitlam mayor blasts cab company, claims a lack of wheelchair taxis

The mayor of Coquitlam is calling out a local cab company, claiming that despite regulations, it did not have any wheelchair-accessible taxis on the road Monday night, stranding some people in his city for hours.

In posts on Facebook and Instagram Mayor Richard Stewart asked if anyone had a wheelchair van available.

“I’ve just received a call from local residents that I have known for years, who are stranded in southwest Coquitlam,” Stewart wrote.

“This happens because Coquitlam/Bel-Air Taxi doesn’t like operating its wheelchair taxis — even though they are required to, and despite repeatedly committing to having them on the road. I get it, the drivers make more money operating a Prius than a wheelchair van. But you’ve committed, and you’re REQUIRED by your licensing.

“Right now we are looking for a way to get these residents home. Tragically, one of them has recently become a wheelchair user, and is unable to use a conventional vehicle.”

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Speaking to CityNews, Stewart says he called the cab company himself to try to arrange a ride for the stranded people for over two hours.

“I phoned the dispatcher and got the regular story, which is that they leave their licensed wheelchair vans in the yard because they are more expensive to operate,” he said.

“She agreed she’d make some calls and try to find a driver, now that the mayor was involved. I gather they probably got a driver to come in, swap vehicles, take the wheelchair van out to the location, pick up this one passenger and his wife, then probably return the wheelchair van to the yard so they could make more money in the Prius.”

It took hours, but Stewart says Coquitlam Taxi eventually did get a wheelchair-accessible cab to the people.

He says that kind of wait time is unacceptable, and more pressure needs to be put on taxi companies to provide reasonable transportation to people with mobility issues.

“The licensing comes from the Passenger Transportation Board and, every now and then, a company will ask for more licenses and there are conditions attached to that. Some of the licenses are for accessible vans and they are the ones that need to be on the road,” he said.

“But they are more expensive, so the PTB is trying to use a cross-subsidization process where the drivers that are in the Prius’ essentially are subsidizing the drivers who are stuck in the more expensive vans,” he continued.

“However, this particular company sells all its licenses to the drivers and, therefore, the drivers are independent operators and Coquitlam Taxi is not much more than a dispatch service. The result is they completely ignore the regulations related to having those vans out serving the public.”

Stewart believes the provincial regulator, needs to “put some teeth” into the requirements.

“Local governments have no power over this, we get to call them in before council and yell at them. The typical power we get is every few years when they apply for more licenses from the PTB, the question gets referred to the city,” he said. “We say we are fine with more licenses, but some have to be wheelchair-accessible vans and they have to be on the road. It’s that last little bit that doesn’t seem to have any enforcement at the provincial level.”

This is not the first time Stewart has raised the issue, having gone public with a similar story on Canada Day in 2018.

It’s also personal.

“I have a bit of an understanding of the issue — I have an episodic disability myself, and for years I occasionally ended up in a wheelchair,” he said.

“It gave me a little bit of an understanding of how completely stranded someone would be if they didn’t have the four wheels that can take them to their destination, whether it’s a medical appointment or simply a dinner with family. We hear these stories all the time about persons whose struggles are real.”

Stewart says he tries as much as possible to build a society in Coquitlam to allow all modes of transportation.

“But if there’s a gap, we can have someone stranded for hours and that is simply outrageous. It’s not right, it’s not fair. The system is designed, and they make commitments, to have those vans available when they’re needed.”

“This family, which suffered a tragedy recently, shouldn’t have to be stuck in a parking lot for hours waiting for the promised van. This needs to be fixed.”

Staffing issues lead to ‘misunderstanding,’ taxi company says

In a statement to CityNews, Bel-Air Taxi is calling it a misunderstanding and that the company strives to provide the best wheelchair service it can.

Manager Inder Naan says he spoke with the dispatcher involved and claims the customers were told it would be a 30- to 45-minute wait.

However, because of a long weekend staffing issue — and a shortage of wheelchair-trained drivers — they decided to call a neighbouring company in Burnaby for assistance.

Naan admits it took a while, but by the time the mayor got involved, the customers had already been picked up by a wheelchair-accessible van.

He says every local taxi company is facing the same problem — a loss of specially trained drivers to ride-sharing services like Uber.

Naan claims Bel-Air has dropped from 17 wheelchair-accessible vans five years ago to only 10 currently.

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