In 2018 author Marcello Di Cintio 'spent a year traveling around Canada'--west to east; south to north--'to seek out the life stories of the nation's taxi drivers.' (p. 5) In Driven, Di Cintio devotes thirteen chapters to introducing cabbies--and in chapter nine he writes about the non-profit ride-share service Ikwe Safe Ride. Ikwe 'matches volunteer female drivers with women needing a ride.' (p. 137)
Driven: The Secret Lives of Drivers
2021
271 pages
As I've lived most of my life in rural Canada, I can count the number of taxi rides I've taken on the fingers of both hands. However, ever since I watched the sitcom Taxi I've been intrigued by the occupation. Taxi was about driving cabs in the United States. Interested to learn about Canadian cabbies drove me to read Driven. (See what I did there. Clever, eh?)
I learned...
An escaped slave from Kentucky, Thornton Blackburn was Canada's first taxi driver but he wasn't the last immigrant cabbie.
'A federal government analysis of 2006 Census data showed that over half of all Canadian taxi divers were born abroad.' (p. 247)
And...
The male-dominated occupation--'Female cabbies remain a rarity if not an outright novelty' (p. 81)--'is physically and psychologically unhealthy' (p. 69) and life-threatening. 'A 2012 Statistics Canada report revealed that taxi drivers were murdered on the job at a higher rate than workers of any other legal profession. Even police officers are killed less often.' (p. 102)
Cabbies are threatened with violence. The occupation is threatened by Uber. Due to technicalities, Uber drivers can jump through loopholes that taxi drivers get tangled in. If things remain unchanged, cabbies 'figure the industry only has about five years left.' (p. 50)
On page 137, Di Cinto writes: 'During my year among the cabbies, I would come to see most taxi drivers as inherently good.'
Nice guys in tough times. Maybe it's time to ask ourselves, what can we do to help?
I found Driven: The Secret Lives of Drivers by Marcello Di Cintio to be an engaging and informative read.
