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The above is a screen capture from Google Earth showing the general area of Clarke Quay, Boat Quay, Circular Road and the Golden Shoe area. For the map showing the direction of travel of the roads in the above photo, please refer to (the copyrighted maps at) SLA Map Service.

The purpose of this post is for everyone to better understand the road conditions in that area, and to see for ourselves if a $8.15 cab fare during peak hours in the CBD is reasonable, or whether the cabbie has indeed taken his passengers for a joy ride to cheat his passengers earn a few more dollars. Do note that boarding a cab during evening peak hours in the CBD would carry a $3 CBD surcharge (until 12 midnight), plus a 35% surcharge on the metered fare (until 9:30pm). That means, upon flag down it would already cost the passenger at least $6.80 [$2.80 flag down, 35% on $2.80 = $1 & $3 CBD surcharge], and it might cost more than that if you flag down the wrong kind of cab – e.g. a Mercedes Cab or even a Sonata.

From the drawings indicating the roundabout route the cabbie took, my guess is that the two ladies boarded at Central, and the cab then turn left and went down River Valley Road. It then make a U-turn either at Clemenceau Avenue, or somewhere near Liang Court, come back to junction where the MITA building is, make a right turn and then took a left down Upper Circular Road. The distance I measure in Google Map was about 1.28km, which means the cab had some stoppage time – either waiting to make the u-turn or at the traffic lights.

Frankly, this is really one of the two shortest route possible. I personally can’t think of a better one which would cost less because anyone who works in the CBD would have known taking a cab and have it move to the opposite side of the road is not such a straight forward task. It’s not everywhere one can make a u-turn, and some of the roads at the next junction allows left turn only because the traffic of the intersecting road heads only in that direction. (Worst yet, in some places the LTA has forbidden right turns – e.g. the junction of Victoria Street & Bras Brasah Road.)

In other words, a $8.15 cab fare is about just right, and it could have been worse if the cabbie act like a complete bastard and go all the way down to Middle Road near Bugis and make his u-turn, or go past River Valley, turn left at Clemenceau Avenue, then left again down Havelock Road, pass Church Street and around Collyer Quay into Battery Road and drop the ladies at OCBC Building.

In short, it is my considered opinion that the cab driver did not deliberately take a roundabout route to ‘cheat his passengers’ . However, he could at least have shown his passengers some courtesy by telling them that their destination was just across the road, and only take them when they insist on the ride.

Anyway, I personally won’t begrudge the cabbie for the money he has made out of this trip. In fact, the real people to blame is the LTA. Consider this, after you take out the $3 CBD surcharge and the 35% peak hour surcharge, the trip would have cost just $3+ or $4+. The purpose of all these surcharges was never to help the cabbie make more money, but just a means to make it so expensive, it ‘prices some of the demand out of the market’ .