By Mindy Schwartz
If you live in Monsey or elsewhere in Rockland County, you’ve likely noticed people complaining about taxi drivers – that they drive too aggressively, weave through traffic, or sometimes seem to cut corners.
But do taxis actually have more accidents than other drivers? Or is this perception shaped by something else?
What Do the Statistics Say?
An independent study conducted by Bruce Schaller of Schaller Consulting in New York showed very surprising results: According to his findings, taxis have a 33% lower crash rate than private cars. In fact, taxis keep getting safer every year.
Why then, does it seem like the opposite?
The Visibility Effect
Traffic experts point out a key factor: taxis stand out. Their bright paint jobs and constant presence on busy streets make any incident involving them more noticeable to the public and media. In contrast, accidents involving regular private vehicles rarely make headlines or linger in public memory.
Another important factor is Monsey’s unique traffic patterns. Home to the largest Chassidish population outside of New York City, Monsey has a transportation dynamic shaped by both communal norms and infrastructure. In many Chassidish communities, women do not drive. Combined with limited public transportation and little walkability, taxis have become a primary means of getting around, accounting for approximately half the local traffic. With so many taxis on the road at any given time, it becomes a simple numbers game: the likelihood of seeing one in an accident inevitably increases – even if their overall safety record is strong.
“Because taxis are on the road so much and in high-traffic areas, it’s natural that they’re seen in more accidents,” says a Rockland County community askan who wished to remain anonymous. “But that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re less safe.”
Arrive’s Response: Driving Toward Safety
Arrive, the largest local taxi service, has acknowledged public concerns. When I spoke to COO Yoely Gratt, he emphasized their focus on safety:
“We take safety very seriously, not just as a policy, but as a responsibility to riders and our community,” said COO Yoely Gratt.
“Drivers complete in-depth training, attend regular safety workshops, and we maintain strict vehicle inspections.”
Gratt noted that when drivers don’t meet those expectations, the company doesn’t hesitate to take action.
“We’ve had to make some difficult decisions,” he said. “But it’s about trust — and earning it every single day.”
Arrive reports that these efforts have led to a measurable decrease in accidents over the past year.
Looking Ahead
While taxis often catch public attention when accidents happen, the data suggests that perception doesn’t always match reality. Companies like Arrive are responding by raising the bar on driver training and vehicle maintenance, aiming not just to meet expectations but to exceed them.
For residents of Monsey and beyond, the hope is clear: safer streets for everyone, whether behind the wheel or in the backseat.
get the statistics from Ramapo Police. Cut the garbage out. You are not safer, quite the opposite!!!!
Biggest problem with them is what happens if they C’V hit you. Their insurance won’t cover more than 10K even if it’s more than that. They are capped. Also a huge pain in the …. to get a hold of any of those companies.
*paid for by Arrive Taxi Company*
💯💯💯
This is a very biased and dishonest article! That statistic from the entire New York State. Nobody thinks that taxis all over NYS crash more frequently than others. In Ramapo they do.
Most private taxi services hire people who view driving as a career, and ride share platform such as Uber and Lyft spend billions on safety programs. This is not the case with our Arrive taxi drivers! Many of them have little to no experience driving in the US.
Let’s not forget that the founders of Arrive chased out the decades old taxi services LaFamilia by spreading stories about their drivers- only to replace those drivers with these.
Also, these taxis carry the worst insurances, give out their cars to non-licensed drivers, and they do crash more often.
It is so sad to see people from our community hurting others by allowing this nonsense to happen.
I can’t give you the exact number of cars on the road at any given time, but here’s what I do know — based on real numbers. Arrive has around 600 cars, Go Cab about 200, Lafa roughly 150, and when you add all the other companies together, you’re easily looking at 1,200+ taxis out there at all times — probably a lot more. That’s more than half the cars on the road, unless you’re going to tell me there are over 2,500 cars driving around at any given moment. So when you see an accident, there’s a very real 50% chance it involves a taxi driver.
Statistics doesn’t mean any thing, And here is why,
1)whenever they can, they try to avoid contacting the police, because a lot of them don’t have driver license (this is not an accusation, it’s a fact.) go to any Bodyshop in the Monsey area and asked them how many people got screwed by arrive (or other company’s) after having an accident.
2) The only reason taxis stand out is not because their bright colors (this is not NYC Yellow cabs) they stand out due to their driving, they are always in a rush to try to get to the next stop, they look at their tablet to see if there’s another stop popping up at their next drop off location
3) i don’t know if anyone realized, arrived has been giving out dash cam recording of their cars BUT ONLY when their NOT at fault, if arrive want to be transparent they should release the dash video from every single accident that occur with one of their cars, and if the driver did something illegal he should not be allowed to drive for them. .
FYI many of these taxis drive Prius’ hybrid with the gas engine kicking in above 20 mph, so you may notice a lot of them driving sloooowly under 20 mph to save on gas. This is very unsafe especially with many aggressive drivers around Monsey driving above 40 mph this is a recipe for many rear ends. Its the same as shortstopping or turning a corner slowly. Bottom line the roads in Monsey are past capacity and the developers are to blame, the road accidents are a natural result of overdevelopment. There is an urgent need to upgrade, widen and open new through roads and other than begging for more state and federal handouts which are anyways insufficient, there needs to be special assessment on all new developments, with a rolling assessment for subdivisions put up since 2004 zoning changes that first opened the up the development spigot which can not be shut off bc the huge profits are too alluring.
We all know what the real problem is… these roads were built for a sleepy little town, not for a town turning into a city where the population is exploding! No matter how carefully you drive, the amount of cars on the road is unsafe! So the real question is, what is the county doing to fix it?!
Who paid for this hit peace,
Did you hire a democratic consultant team to spin a pot full of baloney…..
Your slogan used to be how many arive taxis can you spot? … it should rather be how many aggressive behaviours caused by arive drivers like honking impatiently. Not yielding to right of way did you spot today
Nonsense! I am an x driver for Mottys car service. The goyishe car service charge so cheap they can,t make money from what they charge. They have to drive like maniacs to get as many trips as possible in order to make money. For a $7 trip that took him half an hour due to traffic, they are technically paying the customers to use them. They are dangerous they should be removed from our roads build up the yiddishe car services and pay the appropriate price and the difference you could take from Maser money
After getting side swiped by a car, due to the taxi driving badly, the taxi driver looks over his car and says, that’s going to cost $400 , pay now and that will be all. Either driver of regular car pays $400 cash on the spot or the taxi driver calls “someone” who takes a credit card payment. How many people have had this happen?
The problem is when you need to get somewhere and they have on every intersection a taxi afraid of hiding the 30MPH they drive like 25 at all times and they know people have to get to their destination. All I ask is speed up a little and don’t stand out by going under the speed limit or over. Don’t make people have to tailgate you over a half mile while you have enough space to drive a bit faster. And yes, both women and men drivers are doing it. Don’t try to go from 0 to 30 over a 15-second period. You’re allowed to drive from 0 to 30 5 seconds as well.
Taxi taxi shmaxi. Taxi are here because we are lazy bums dont wanna wait on the street for a bus, go to israel, woman dont drive there either, how many taxi are there? Gomlook at the bus station – PACKET.
So here we go again, we are lazy to stand at the bus stop, we create the taxi business, we complain when they drive slow to get to your home [calling few companoes and picking the first to come]; so we are causing them to speed……
And we are the one to cry Taxis accidents not safe and other bla bla bla
Crooks and hypocrsy has no limit?
Why don’t taxis ever have working headlights?
where did the communicated content label disappear to????
Your statistics are all fine. However, you fail to mention the unpredictability of these taxi drivers. They cut in front of oncoming vehicles all the time. They don’t obey stop sign laws, to the point where drivers always have to keep both eyes on these taxis at even 4 way stop signs. I reported to arrive numerous times when arrive taxis almost hit my car when I had the right of way. Regardless, arrive taxis specifically drive slow and hold up traffic for miles on end. As a result, the frustration mounts on all those drivers behind them. As you mention they want to save on gas, but its dangerous. I rode with arrive a few times in the past, and they have a terrible sense of direction even with waze. it’s incomprehensible to bury our head in the sand and believe they are not the crux of the accidents in Monsey
You are cherry picking data. Very suspicious that you don’t quote the actual survey source. You cannot look at a statewide statistic. Also you are literally copy pasting the same article from many other news sites.
The only way to truly know like a few other have mentioned is to look at mechanics and speak to local people in Rockland. Rockland county by far has more terrible taxi drivers and they and are disproportionately more responsible for accidents.
Covering up for them is not the solution. Run a real story about this to raise awareness and increase safety.
I think a way to combat having too many taxis on the road is to build up Rockland county transportation system. They should add more bus routes that keep to a reliable schedule. The busses here are a disaster.
The taxi drivers tend to disobey many traffic signs. They frequently park in no parking zones, make u- turns in the middle of the street (blocking traffic while doing so), barely slow for stop signs., aggressively pass cars or cut off cars. They also stop in the middle of the street picking up or letting off their customer.
Basically, they are untrustworthy and don’t follow rules of the road.
Not all, but way too many of them.
Please, all cars that smell like boiling gasoline should be taken off the road every time I smell it. I get sick. It’s used to be a problem with La Familia, and now with Arrive, or take it to a mechanic.