Taxi Drivers

What rhymes with "Times"? Does it matter? Not to poets evoking the flair of Times Square, who stood behind a microphone on a gusty evening to read the winning entries in the Bright Lights Big Verse: Poems of Times Square contest. About 500 people competed in the recent effort to improve the image of the chaotic stretch of concrete once synonymous with petty crime, peep shows and sleazy shops. If the judges and winners -- whose work can be seen online at www.timessquarenyc.

It was only a matter of time before the strip clubs and cabbies went to war. Las Vegas' fortunes, which have fallen along with the nation's, can be measured in shorter lines at the airport, sparse crowds at the roulette tables and lighter traffic on Interstate 15. But the recession has also strained the "green handshake" culture, where businesses trade cash and favors for recommendations from doormen, concierges, limo drivers and cabbies.

The yellow cab pulled over to pick up a passenger across from the Empire State Building as its driver, Mahbub Hossain, chatted on his cellphone headset. If this had been a test, Hossain would have ended up with a $200 fine.

A group of New York City taxi drivers wants a $1 fuel surcharge on fares. Members of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance said they will meet today at the Manhattan headquarters of the Taxi and Limousine Commission to propose an extra $1 on their meters to offset high gas prices. But the commission chairman, Matthew W. Daus says the drivers are out of luck. "Under no circumstances is the TLC considering a gas surcharge," Daus said. Several other U.S. cities have implemented taxi fuel surcharges.

The line at the taxi stand outside the Biltmore Hotel was six cabs deep Monday morning, even though there was space for only two cars. Sam Onumonu's car was the third one in line. The stand, said Onumonu as he leaned forward in his seat, was packed for one simple reason: It's one of the easiest places for a driver to get a fare in downtown. "There aren't too many people flagging us down," he said. "It happens only when there are people with young kids, or something going down.

Cabdriver Osman Chowdhury said Wednesday that he never once considered keeping the 31 diamond rings he found inside a suitcase left in his Manhattan cab by a Dallas woman who had given him a 30-cent tip. "Why would I think I could keep it?" said Chowdhury, 41, of Queens. "It wasn't mine." Instead, Chowdhury did the right thing: He helped his supervisor track down the woman and returned the suitcase, a laptop computer and the rings.

Muslim cabdrivers at Minnesota's biggest airport will face new penalties, including a two-year revocation of their taxi permits, if they refuse to give rides to travelers carrying liquor or accompanied by dogs, the board overseeing operations ruled Monday. The Metropolitan Airports Commission, which was responding to complaints about the liquor issue, voted unanimously to impose the penalties, which take effect in May. A large number of taxi drivers in the area of the Minneapolis-St.

For taxi driver Michael Byrne, this city's mean streets have turned a lot meaner since he was cursed with a medallion number he insists has brought him nothing but bad luck. His taxi identification number is 666, which some associate with evil and the devil. Given the number last August after another cabdriver refused it, Byrne took an unusual precaution: He had his cab blessed at a local church.

A group representing thousands of taxi drivers said it would idle cabs in September if New York City goes ahead with a plan to require the installation of GPS tracking systems. Starting Oct. 1, as the city's 13,000 taxis come up for inspections they must have the global positioning system equipment along with touch-screen monitors that will let passengers pay by credit card.

Los Angeles police made nearly 650 arrests of "bandit" taxicab drivers in the first seven months of the year, more than double the number in all of 2006, city officials said Wednesday. The increase is attributed to the Bandit Taxi Enforcement Program, a joint venture between the city Department of Transportation and the Los Angeles Police Department that targets cab drivers who officials say are often unlicensed and unregulated.