A symbolic medallion installation for what the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission (NYC TLC) hails as an achievement: wheelchair accessible taxis or WAVs making up more than 50% of the city’s yellow fleet.

“You don’t have to plan your hot dates according to your transportation,” Milagros Franco of the Brooklyn Center for the Independence of the Disabled said. “Hallelujah. Praise the Lord that I no longer have to do that. I have options now. I can now use a taxi.”

What You Need To Know

  • 50.7% of the active fleet — or over 5,100 — are now able to take wheelchairs
  • The upgrades come after a lawsuit filed in 2011 by disabled New Yorkers and advocates when less than 2% of taxis were wheelchair accessible
  • The NYC Taxi and Limousine Commission missed several deadlines after a 2013 settlement, and COVID forced many medallion owners to put their vehicles into storage due to lack of rides

  • The milestone makes the city's taxi fleet the most accessible in the world, and combined with ride-share vehicles, there are now over 12,000 accessible vehicles
  • Taxis meet customers in less than 10 minutes 90% of the time

Years in the making, after a 2013 court settlement with several disability advocate groups, and several missed deadlines, the TLC has finally reached 5,140 taxis or 50.7% of the city’s active fleet.

About 3,000 medallions are in storage after owners gave up on them due to the pandemic. But when they come out, they must be wheelchair accessible too.

“This is the most accessible fleet in the entire country combined with our for-hire fleet,” TLC Commissioner David Do said. “We now have 12,000 assessable vehicles and more than 90% of them meet passengers in 10 minutes or less.”

Franco says she was over 40 before she was able to take a wheelchair accessible taxi and now she wants more.

“I’m greedy,” she said. “I want 100% now. Now that we’ve proven we can get to the 50, we can now do definitely 100%.”

And there will be more to come. In addition to those coming out of storage, every seven years a medallion must be converted to a wheelchair accessible taxi if they aren’t already — but the cost can be prohibitive.

“We’ve been working on a low interest loan program with a nonprofit community lender, but there’s also a role here for the city and the state to play, where they could repeal the taxes on wheelchair accessible taxis,” Bhairavi Desai, executive director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, said. “It would save the drivers about $5,700 when these cars right now cost them between $80,000 to $83,000.”

The city provides about $30,000 for the conversion, but it’s still difficult for drivers recovering from the downturn during COVID.

“But we didn’t stop there,” Commissioner Do said. “With the partnership with the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, with our state partners, including ESD, the Empire State Development and the Disability Opportunity Fund, we seeded $5 million so that drivers could get low-interest loans so that they can buy their vehicles.”

That will help 100 medallion owners starting in July.

The TLC has one more court-mandated deadline: to make the whole fleet, including taxis in storage, accessible in three years.