Dear Taxi Industry Members
I am pleased to announce that the Taxis and Accessible Services Division has updated our name to better reflect our work, which has expanded over the past few years. Our new name is Taxis, Access & Mobility Services. This maintains our focus on the taxi industry and disability access while also including the burgeoning mobility services sector, which has become a core focus.
Our work as a division has always been anchored in making the transportation system more accessible. And as a customer-facing division that has overseen the regulations governing the San Francisco taxi industry, our service area has grown to include permitting and enforcement oversight for new mobility services such as Commuter Shuttles, Private Transit Vehicles and Scooter Share. Taxis are a core service in the mobility sector and leading with “Taxis” in our division name maintains the primacy of the industry, while positioning taxis in the broader mobility context.
Why the need for a name change?
Over the past few years, transportation options in San Francisco have changed significantly, and the functions of the division have expanded as well. A variety of mobility services and technologies have emerged, from mobile applications that connect passengers with on demand service, shared ride van services, shared scooter services, to autonomous vehicles that are currently being tested on our City streets. These new mobility services present both opportunities and challenges to the safe and efficient movement of people and goods in San Francisco, which is mandated by City Charter in the Transit-First Policy.
In response to these changes, Taxis, Access & Mobility Services and the Streets Division (formerly Sustainable Streets) have partnered to develop and implement permit programs for services within SFMTA’s jurisdiction to balance the drive for innovation with the goals of providing safe, reliable, accessible and equitable transportation in San Francisco. The Streets Division is the lead in incubating new mobility programs in collaboration with Taxis, Access & Mobility Services, and Taxis, Access & Mobility Services is the operational division and takes the lead in regulating and managing on-going mobility permit programs. The respective roles that each division has been performing to date are not changing and we will continue our partnership moving forward. By harmonizing and standardizing regulated mobility permit programs, SFMTA is positioned to oversee existing and future programs.
This name change reflects what the division does today, and how it will evolve in the coming years.
Taxis, Access and Mobility Services, at your service!