Skip to main content

Toronto maps out new rules for vehicle-for-hire industry

Toronto City Council has amended its vehicles-for-hire rules to improve safety and accessibility of taxis and private transportation companies including Uber and Lyft. Toronto mayor John Tory, says:” These new and updated requirements are a necessary step in protecting the residents and visitors of this city. Regardless of where they are going or how far the distance, we want to make sure passengers are able to access the service and get to their destination safely." The new rules will make it mandatory
July 30, 2019 Read time: 2 mins

Toronto City Council has amended its vehicles-for-hire %$Linker: 2 External <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?><dictionary /> 0 0 0 <span style="color: windowtext">rules</span> false https://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/municode/toronto-code-546.pdf true false%> to improve safety and accessibility of taxis and private transportation companies including 8336 Uber and 8789 Lyft.

Toronto mayor John Tory, says:” These new and updated requirements are a necessary step in protecting the residents and visitors of this city. Regardless of where they are going or how far the distance, we want to make sure passengers are able to access the service and get to their destination safely."

The new rules will make it mandatory for all drivers to take a third-party training programme approved by the Canadian city. Preliminary topics will include safely transporting passengers, driving in an urban setting and providing an accessible service. In addition, all drivers will be required to securely mount all handheld devices to their vehicle and display notices if a camera is being used to record passengers.

The council says an Accessibility Fund Programme will help offset the higher cost of providing a wheelchair-accessible service. It will be funded through a regulatory charge on companies that do not provide this service.

As part of the move, the council has made changes to improve the licensing and enforcement of vehicles for hire. This includes increasing the amount of data that is collected to help inform future regulations.

The requirements will come into effect in January 2020.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Emovis to operate Ireland’s M50 toll until 2021
    October 16, 2018
    Emovis will operate the free-flow tolling on Ireland’s M50 up to March 2021 following an extension to its agreement with Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII). The toll services company Emovis says it has been collecting funds of over €1 billion for TII to invest back into infrastructures of Ireland following a 63% increase in traffic to 143,000 passages a day. In March, Emovis confirmed its toll interoperability cloud-based hub in Ireland cleared over 50 million transactions in 2017. The solution is
  • Emergency call forum: Where do we go from here?
    October 9, 2013
    The Ertico partnership is hosting a one-day forum in Brussels on 7 November to examine the future development of automated emergency call (eCall) and the evolution of telematics services. Discussions and debates will take place around a series of topics, including: the status of emergency call once eCall is deployed; challenges to enable further business opportunities; the potential of new technologies and new services within emergency call and beyond eCall.
  • Imtech brings ImFlow and ImCity solutions to Intertraffic
    March 24, 2014
    The Traffic & Infrastructure division of Imtech, the global, Netherlands-headquartered technical services and ICT company, is exhibiting a vast array of transport-related solutions and services from across Europe, North America and Brazil. This year’s exhibits demonstrate live projects from across the global business, from traffic management systems in Copenhagen and St. Petersburg to parking technology in Rio de Janeiro, tunnel solutions in Maastricht to telecommunications networks in Brussels. The company
  • Register now for 2nd European SUMP Conference
    May 22, 2015
    The second European Conference on Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMP) takes place in Bucharest, Romania, at Politehnica University of Bucharest on 16 and 27 June 12015. It is the principal annual event for the international community of practitioners, policy makers and academics from across Europe to come together to debate key issues, highlight developments in mobility planning and exchange ideas and experience. Under the overall theme of the conference, ‘Sustainable mobility for everyone’, nine