The Ministry of Transport decided to hold an emergency discussion on the problem of taxis at Ben Gurion Airport, following publications on the matter in Israel Hayom, and after a long period in which many tourists and Israelis find it difficult to cope with what is happening in terms of taxis at Ben Gurion Airport.
According to testimonies obtained by the system, passengers tell of drivers who are unwilling to take them to nearby destinations, of drivers who are unwilling to use the meter, of those who enter the terminal areas illegally and offer a taxi for arrivals, and more. The peak came yesterday (Monday) when the police released footage of a driver without a taxi driver's number, snatching $1,000 from passengers he was transporting from Ben Gurion Airport to Tel Aviv.
It is not yet known if the driver is a licensed taxi driver, but according to the police, he picked up the paid passengers from the airport, underscoring the need to regulate taxis there.
Taxis at Ben Gurion Airport (Archive), photo: Yehoshua Ben Yosef
As of today, there is no company that operates the taxis in an authorized manner at Ben Gurion Airport, which leaves a kind of loophole for quite a few drivers to act as they seemingly wish. The issue has been discussed for several years and there are attempts to find solutions for it, including a tender that is in the making, but it seems that at the moment there are not enough attractive bids to enter the tender, which could lead to a situation of further delay in achieving a solution to the taxi crisis.
In a discussion scheduled to take place tomorrow at the Ministry of Transport, two ideas for solving the crisis are expected to be advanced: the first is the addition of inspectors from the Ministry of Transport who will come to Ben Gurion Airport to enforce the problem, and the second – training inspectors at Ben Gurion Airport who will be able to enforce the issue themselves. As is well known, the Airports Authority is not an enforcement body, which requires legislation that will allow its inspectors to enforce and punish drivers who break the law.
The sting continues. People waiting for taxis at Ben Gurion Airport (archive, the subjects have nothing to do with the information),
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