Dear Editor,

I must have missed the newspaper publication where it was gazetted that the far right lane along Constant Spring Road, immediately in front of the Half-Way-Tree Transport Centre, has been designated a taxi stand.

Quite often when I drive through Half-Way-Tree I make the silly mistake of occupying this lane, much to the displeasure of legal and illegal taxi operators who believe I am hindering their picking up and dropping off of passengers on the busy thoroughfare. It’s worse when I dare toot my horn, for this is when the ‘loader men’ jump in and get abusive while accusing me of not allowing them to “eat a food”.

I am further convinced that I must be in the wrong because all of this takes place in full view of policemen who one morning were only too busy to notice that my vehicle registration had expired after I came to a screeching halt to avoid hitting passengers alighting from and boarding a ‘robot taxi’ in the same right lane. The policemen on duty never cared that commuters were unsafely darting into the steady stream of vehicular traffic coming down Constant Spring Road, or that the ‘robot taxis’ were impeding the flow of traffic. No, Sir It was my vehicle registration that expired the day before which caught their eagle eyes.

So, there I was waiting patiently to be ticketed while multiple vehicles made ‘quick’ stops, passengers made hasty exits, and new commuters hopped in to hurriedly claim seats while drivers shouted their routes to attract more customers — all regardless of police presence, the ‘No stopping’ sign, or the the traffic light signalling green.

This is Half-Way-Tree as we have come to know it and, sadly, as the police have come to condone it.

Barry Broadwell

broadwell.barry@yahoo.com