There were several hundred of them this Thursday morning.
After a snail's operation on the A6 from Denfert-Rochereau, angry taxis blocked the arrival of three of the four Orly terminals, forcing customers to finish the route on foot, suitcases in hand.
“We didn't think there would be so many people,” smiles Walid Hanina, president of the Team Taxi union, in front of the continuous line of vehicles with hazard lights on.
Everyone was mobilized to denounce, among other things, competition from fake taxis, the very ones who scam customers by doubling the price of a trip.
“There are more and more of them”
“We don’t understand why, since we denounced the phenomenon, they are still there?
Why isn't there a police crew permanently on site to make sure they don't come back,” asks one of them, on the deserted A6 motorway.
“We were promised better coordination for the Olympics, but this is only cosmetic.
What we see on the ground is that there are more and more of them,” sighs Walid.
" It is not fair.
We follow the rules, and they pass us by, take the best customers and defraud them with complete impunity.
And their behavior affects our image.
Afterwards, people turn to VTCs…” analyzes Yassine, 29 years old.
Also read: Roissy Airport: from their “control tower”, illegal drivers spied on the taxi police
More broadly, the strikers also criticize the management of taxis at Orly: “Our operating conditions here are catastrophic.
We have become invisible since Paris Airport installed a management company,” assures Kader, 27, in front of the blocked barriers of Terminal 3.
According to them, “people wait for a taxi, three quarters of an hour on one side and us, two to three hours on the other”.
And, recently, a route that was reserved for them has just been closed to them: “It’s already taking a long time to get to Orly.
It then takes us another 20 minutes to arrive at the terminal.
All this to have races stolen by illegal drivers, Ghalid lists.
Honestly, it's too much!
".
Paris Airport (ADP) assures that the issue of fake taxis is a “daily concern”.
Referring to a “scourge in terms of image and reception of passengers”, ADP explains that “the police intervene several times a week to fight against illegal taxis”.
“Our agents are trained to report any illegal canvassing.”
Preventive actions to inform passengers
The airport manager also relies on preventive actions - displays on walls, on the ground and at eye level, sound announcements - to inform passengers.
“Our new Paris Aéroport site, put online for the Olympic Games, will be able to tell passengers as soon as they arrive at the airport the waiting times in the official lines, and how to join them,” ADP further promises.
The phenomenon also weighs on Parisian stations, where the presence of illegal taxis regularly generates tensions with authorized professionals.
“Our current scourge is fake taxis.
They scam travelers and are very aggressive,” explained Marlène Dolveck, general director of Gares et Connexions, to Le Parisien last December.
At the beginning of January, a family from Brazil reported being scammed while leaving the Gare du Nord by an “unofficial Uber”.
“From the start of the journey, we noticed that the taximeter showed a fixed rate of 78 euros, which seemed excessive to us,” said the father.
It took the threat of calling the police for the rogue driver to lower the price to 50 euros.
Still more expensive than what a taxi ride from Gare du Nord to their Parisian hotel would have cost the family…