Andrew Kay: Yak Yak Yak

Not so Hansom
not so Hackneyed

Having given up on running a car myself, please note all you Greens, I now rely on walking, buses, lifts from friends and taxis.
I can remember well my first ever ride in a taxi – I was 18, yes 18 years old. Where and when I grew up taxis were not a part of normal life so it took a move to London to make me really aware of what a joy a taxi ride could be.
It was all black Hackney carriages back then or were they Hansom, I never did get to grips with what the difference was. They were the shiny black scarab beetles of London’s roads and once bitten by that bug I was a taxi lover for ever. Oh I know that people relate apocryphal tales of taxi woes, but I never had much problem with them. On the whole they were honest sorts who would take you from A to B in the most convenient manner. Whiners should note that distance is not the defining part of how a cabby makes his wage, but the number of journeys they make.
So you get the message, I like taxi drivers and I like taxis. Or do I?
Taxi drivers I still rate, I would never dis them here, after all my picture is at the top of the page, but really, taxi drivers do a pretty good job. The thing I dislike right now is the tank. Yes, tank, and I think most of you will know what I mean. The huge people carriers that have been brought into service because they can accommodate wheelchairs. This directive comes from the city council, and I am sure that it is well intentioned, really I am. I mean after all, who could imagine that the city council would bring into play an action that would not be in the people’s best interests?
But these tanks, I simply cannot get on with them. Indeed I cannot get on them or in them should I say, and getting out again is no easy matter.
The things are too high. The steps that are meant to aid boarding seldom work and once onboard the seats are so far back that in manoeuvering to get there I quite often miss and end up on the floor.

I’m not disabled by any means, but as I get older I am not as supple as I once was and this whole process is uncomfortable, I dread to think how less physically able people manage to board.
And as if that was not enough the sliding doors have their own issues. Firstly they are heavy, really heavy and so hard to move that quite often the driver will have to get out and close the door for you. If like me you live on a steep hill then opening that door becomes a Herculean task, expecially if you need to lock it into the open position because of a hill. Heaven help you if you don’t as the damned thing will slide back on you trapping you under its weight.
Am I alone in thinking that these giant people carriers are simply not a suitable solution? I know that from some of the drivers that pick me up feel the same.
How long will it be before someone is disabled by a vehicle that has been designated disabled friendly?
Of course I could just walk and get the bus and right now I am being nagged to do so. A fellow columnist wrote recently about his Apple Watch, how he got one, then sent it back, then got another.
I waited a while before getting one, just to see what the general opinion would be – and on the whole it has been good, especially from all us Apple users. How that brand divides society, lovers and haters locked in a fight over operating systems and the like – life’s too short, make your choice and get on with it.
I bought my Apple Watch, ironically the sports model, In Manchester from what I call Church but you may better know as The Apple Store, I think more people attend Apple stores these days than churches or at least it looks that way.

Once bought I spent the first week discovering what it will do and I have to say I am pleased with it, it is fairly easy to navigate, has functions that make life nice and simple and it tells the time too, far easier than having to dig a phone out of a bag or pocket.
It also nags, nag nag nag, all day long, tapping my wrist and telling me to stand up and walk about for a minute to achieve my goal. It tells me how may active minutes there have been, which is not many as I sit at this desk most of the day, and politely suggests that I get busy.
This is of course the Apple way, politely encouraging me to get up and get moving. I also have it formatted so that I can call a Brighton cab from my wrist, nifty and at the same time defeating the watch’s efforts to get me to take more exercise.
I really have no issue with disabled facilities, I grew up helping to looking after a disabled relative and know only too well how difficult it can be to get around and to gain access to places – I just don’t see that the turquoise and white tanks are doing that good a job.