sitting at home with broken leg after being knock over by taxi and have had two van writen off by taxi driver so would say yes bad driver most of them

How could I forget this? A taxi driver with a mini bus drove into the back of me and then proceeded to rant it was my fault 😆 I did mention about breaking distances etc but clearly the taxi highway code is different 🙄 I had the last laugh though as I drove off, whilst his transit was steaming away 😆 Cheeky twonk rang me at home trying to intimidate me about my story 😆

i think taxi drivers smoke in their cabs because it masks the smell of the customers some of which are lifting, and they drive fast to get the customer out before they shit/piss or spew

Since it's taken you a day to come up with it legend76, I am right in assuming that your latest explanation is as a result of an unfortunate incident which occurred today ?

When the kids reach a certain age when they are involved with all sorts of school / team stuff…
We all become TAXI drivers….

In 25 years cycling I've only been hit once by a car – driven badly by an uninsured taxi driver

idave, an uninsured taxi driver isn't realy a taxi driver !! He's just a criminal bum. Around here as soon as your insurance expires your vehicle goes on stop. It's no longer a taxi untill you take a new certificate to the hackney carriage office. Bad luck with being hit, but you've more chance of being hit by mr.average than a properly licensed, insured taxi.

he was driving a taxi. hence i made the assumption he was a taxi driver. he also paid way over the odds in cash to compensate for the damage to bike and clothing and keep the law out of it.

"Professional Driver"

Hmmmmmm….. Boll@cks!
sorry, but the way that people who drive a white van/HGV/taxi for a living describe themselves as a "professional" is just something that, rightly or wrongly, gets my goat.
A Professional is someone who has undertaken a serious course of education/training/skills building/apprenticeship over a serious period of time (usually years). They then have to continually retrain/re-educate themselves for their entire career in order to keep up to date with the latest advances within their profession. They are faced with regular stringent revalidation exercises to retain their right to practice their profession as it evolves over the years. They are assessed by their peers regularly and brought to account of they fall short of required standards. They may be brought to book for having brought their profession into disrepute even if they have done nothing wrong within their particular line of work. And if they fail to do all this, they have their right to continue working within that profession removed, regardless of the effect on their livelihood.
This means Doctors, Nurses, Lawyers, Teachers, Police officers, Paramedics, Pilots, etc.

Being a full time driver does not make someone a professional. They may in fact be a consumate profesional in their approach to their employment/career, and may meet many of the above criteria, but they are not professionals. .
I'm sorry, but over the years, somewhere along the line, doing something for a living somehow became synonmous with being a professional. I blame footballers!

I'm sorry if this gets the back up of the many experienced, considerate and responsible full time drivers on here, but I'm afraid it's true. A few weeks of HGV training, a test, and occasional medicals don't make you a professional i'm afraid. Nor does "doing the knowledge".

Most taxi drivers that i have come into contact with are very good though, and have always exhibited a professional attitude in a less than perfect environment. Delivery drivers though, thats another matter!

Stands back and awaits incoming!

I Know its splitting hairs idave, but I take pride in my job, An illegal taxi isn't realy a taxi just the same as unqualified layman isn't a doctor. You might call yourself one and try and do the job but your just a con.
I know its hard to resist the cash, but idealy you should have got the police involved and got him of the road.

I'm sorry if this gets the back up of the many experienced, considerate and responsible full time drivers on here……

I bet it doesn't.

And may I say, your rambling and endlessly waffling rant, was worthy of any self-respecting taxi driver 8)

Good rant Drillski but I've never described myself or heard another taxi driver describe themsselves as "professionals". We are as you rightly point out professional in the sense we're paid to do the job. I agree with you though, it gets on my tit when bin men for instance are called "enviromental hygiene professionals"

some good professional drivers but i get a little unghappy that the majority consider 10-20mph above the urban speed limit is the norm, ok its money and most times reactions are better than other drivers but not after a 12 hour shift on a too familiar route – that from the guy in the back seats viewpoint

as a ped' had two annoying incidents in the same week crossing the busy road outside the children's hospital
one taxi did an illegal (for any vehicle) left turn as we crossed a pelican on the green man forcing me to jump back with my 6 yr old

later in the week on another crossing 30m up road we crossed with green man but taxi speeding down bus lane ignored the red – fortunately i was looking for the usual cyclists who don't stop

the only people i've ever heard call taxi drivers professional are the police when dishing out a bollocking,but there's good and bad in every profesion, i just get abit fed up at being called a **** every time another driver makes a mistake or pedestrian for that matter. just today a lady called me just that because she wanted to cross the road and expected me to slam on the brakes so she wouldn't have to break her stride!

As people taxi drivers are no worse and no better than the rest of us.

However the ones in Edinburgh at least seem to believe the laws of the road don't apply to them. I was walking up towards Charlotte Sq yesterday and watched one go through a red light that had gone red two seconds before (two seconds is a big distance in a car). At the next set of lights I actually caught him and pointed it out to him. He claimed he hadn't seen them, which was such a blatant lie it was unbelievable. And there were loads of tourists and the like around. He could have killed someone quite easily.

I said I was going to report him to the police, though I didn't. Should I maybe have?

I did report a Citylink bus driver to his company a few weeks ago for doing something similar on Queen St, and at way above the speed limit at a very busy junction. The company got back to me and said he'd been taken off driving duties and sent for retraining, so hopefully that'll stop him doing it again.

That said, the worst of all are courier and delivery drivers.