Not only will he save on gas but he'll save on oil changes and brake pad replacements. Once he learns the ins and outs of driving he'll really save on gas down in San Antonio.

He'll also be spreading the word to many many people who probably wouldn't have come in contact with a hybrid until a few years.

If he drives like cab drivers I've seen in Chicago I bet he'll have a hard time seeing even 35mpg lol. I like the idea though.

Andrew Grant of Vancouver, BC, Canada has been driving Prius automobiles as Taxis for several years. He states very clearly that he drives his 2004 Prius Cab 'gingerly' & gets 65-70 miles per Imperial Gallon which translates to 54-58 miles per Gallon-US. You can read about his experiences & even see a video & his maintenance records at: http://www.hybridexperience.ca/Toyota_Prius.htm

My personal in-town or in-city driving & I do not drive 'gingerly' in my 2004 Prius, gives me, depending mostly on temperature & weather, 42-51 miles per gallon-US (rainy weather really minimizes my mileage as it does with any vehicle).

He loses aerodynamics with the taxi light on top too!

All kidding aside, taxis seem like a lost opportunity for GM/Ford. Many taxi drivers haul around in the larger sedans made by American companies; GM/Ford could have made a hybrid with government/public services in mind and sold plenty.

I know if I were with some friends and could choose between a Prius and a "regular" taxi, I'd take the regular*, since it's bigger and more comfortable.

At any rate, kudos to this fellow, and I hope he shares his success stories with other cabbies, spurring a purchasing frenzy of the hybrid taxis.

* Well fine, I'd take the Prius because I'm an energy geek. I'm speaking for those who couldn't give a care about the gas consumption of the taxi in which they're riding.

He'll still get in the high 40s easily; I drove my Insight delivering pizzas in a mountain city area, and still averaged 57mpg. For thoe who don't know, pizza delivery guys drive as hard or harder than cabbies :)

I'd be more concerned with his battery life with the constant assist/regen of unlimited city driving; but he should save more than enough to pay for the cost of a battery... plus his battery will be tax deductable; the fuel is only partially deductable.

So when this thing picks me up at the airport where does the luggage go?

If you pile luggage all the way up to the glass in the back hatch, that's more space than a Crown Vic's trunk.

I saw a Prius taxi here at Burbank Airport in LA, California.

There are now probably more than 100 in service in Vancouver and Victoria, I see them everywhere! I don't think the Prius will have any problems with the battery since it can generate power and use it at the same time, unlike the Insight where it can only do one or the other. Battery management in the Prius keeps a higher charge (40%-80%), Insights go down to 20% charge.

For those who are confused by how a Prius looks, it's a hatchback. When you open the back hatch, you have lots of luggage space behind the back seat.

Not that it would often happen with Prius taxicabs, but if you had one passenger with a huge amount of luggage, the passenger could sit up front in the passenger seat, and the rear seat can be folded down to increase the luggage space to a very large capacity. That's one of the reasons Toyota designed the Prius as a hatchback -- to have more flexibility as to luggage space vs. passenger space.

By the way, there are four taxicab companies in San Francisco with some Priuses in the their fleets. I've ridden in Green Taxi and in Bay Taxi Priuses and talked to the drivers about them. All of the drivers love their Priuses and say they've been reliable and absolutely economical when it comes to gasoline. The latter quality pleases cab drivers who have an impossible time making a profit every day in a Crown Vic. Once they pay for gas and pay the cab company for use of the cab, they have almost nothing left over for income. The Prius gets almost 50 mpg in San Francisco, they all said, and they actually make money driving a Prius.

I found that the room in the back seat was ample, and I'm a large person. There's ample luggage space, too.

Frankly, I think the Crown Vic should not be used for cabs anymore. Prius is the way to go. Yellow Cab is using some kind of Ford SUV hybrid -- the mileage isn't nearly as good, and they're difficult to get in and out of for a lot of people because of the high step-up SUV's have. I also think that SUV's are a major pain in the backside for other drivers who have to deal with them and I really wish there were way fewer of them in the City. SUV's are fine for people who live where road conditions warrant a 4-wheel drive vehicle with high clearance, i.e., in the mountains or out in the country somewhere, where roads aren't always paved.