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Oldest Working Taxi


sierraman

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On the EG Civic collection mission, I got a ride in a 240k mile 55 plate C200 CDI taxi on a Christchurch hackney plate. As far as I could tell he was a one man operation owner driver. He only took cash, and discounted my fare slightly because he enjoyed talking to me! 

In Rochdale there's a W plate Avensis minicab still knocking about on a quarter of a million miles - I think there are two and the other one is even older, but I've not seen that one for while.

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When I lived in Southport, the loal authority insisted on a maximum working age of eight years old for both Hackney and Private Hire vehicles.  Not sure if it still applies... But in Cyprus there were plenty of older Mercs doing taxi work, and to my enormous surprise I found one in Barrow too, which has appeared on my spotting thread; a 1987 Merc 190D.  The owner-driver died last year.  I've seen the car a couple of times since, but I don't think it's still "on the job."  Shame, because it looked mint, it was a credit to its owner.

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25 minutes ago, willswitchengage said:

Book your winter holiday to Morocco. Cheap flights and COVID-easy local rules. Definitely the most Autoshitey country I've ever been to, mainly French stuff but Merc taxis are popular.

My taxi upon arrival in Marrakesh was a facelifted Fiat Uno.  There seemed to be plenty of those doing the rounds, in assorted shades of beige.

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Still plenty of extremely shabby TX1s plying for hire around Belfast, which must be hitting advanced miles. I'm sure I've seen one on an R-plate not that long ago.

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Best not to ask too many questions about their PSV test status...

There was still a Sierra minicab doing the rounds until about 2010 too; unsurprisingly, it was utterly hanging.

Every now and again when I'm on the Bangor ringroad I catch sight of a white E100 Corolla liftback with a taxi sign on the roof, but I've yet to snap a pic of it. Think it's on a 1991 reg, so fairly cracking on in years.

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My Friend owned a 2006 Avensis D4D (2.0) Estate, that was an ex taxi with 488,000 on the clock, engine and box were still perfect. The rest was starting to fall off somewhat. Needless to say I bought it for £250 to take it over 500k, which I did, I sold it on to someone else and it still going, I believe with around 545,000 on it now.

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2 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

Still plenty of extremely shabby TX1s plying for hire around Belfast, which must be hitting advanced miles. I'm sure I've seen one on an R-plate in the last few months....

Given how Covid and Wrath of Khan are getting rid of London TX1s in favour of Chinese electrics, I'd say Belfast will have a near-inexhaustible supply of TX1s in the years ahead.

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5 hours ago, Amishtat said:

Don't know whether it's still going but there was a blue J-reg 940 saloon still working around Ipswich until  a couple of years ago 

Sadly, possibly not according to this article:

https://www.ipswichstar.co.uk/news/john-winlow-volvo-too-old-ipswich-borough-council-2884276

I recall there being a follow-up piece in the EADT or Star, can't recall what the conclusion was.

When I started work in Attleborough in 2000 there was an S/T-reg Volvo 245 still in use as a taxi. Also, in Cambridge in the very early '90s, when many of the drivers favoured Nissan Laurels, there was a BMC Farina still operating.

This Carina E, along with a similar dark blue example, was in use in Diss in 2012:

Yes! Got it at last... 1993 Toyota Carina E Taxi, Diss

Failed its last MoT in 2014 when it'd done just under 280k miles.

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Not the oldest, but about 7 years ago there was an ex taxi Scoda Octavia with the NA 1.9 SDi engine going through an auction in Birtley with just over 550k miles and still running well.

I was so impressed at the time it set me on a path of seeking out/buying cars with the SDi engine, a habit I'm still struggling to shift if I'm honest!

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11 minutes ago, tobyd said:

Pity there doesn't seem to be a market for a "classic cabs" service.

Imagine: "Thank you for choosing ShiteCabs, the yesteryear door-to-door service...."

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