TLC Proposes Cell Phone Ban for Taxi Drivers

The Taxi and Limousine Commission wants to ban New York hacks from talking on cell phones while they drive, according to the New York Post. The crackdown even pertains to cabbies using hands-free headsets.

Taxi drivers everywhere, I predict, will be in an uproar. And who can blame them? It must get lonely, with no one to talk to all day. Maybe they want to talk to their families on the other side of the world. Or maybe they want to complain to each other about the jerk customers in the backs of their cabs.

But I have to say, I'm all for ban. Studies show that people driving while on the phone -- even using hands-free headsets -- are as dangerous as drunk drivers. (Read a New York Times piece on this topic.)

Full disclosure: My dad used to manage a trucking company, and I spent my teenage years having driver safety rules pounded into my head. The fist rule: driving is not a passive activity. You need to be aware. Don't put on your make-up while driving, don't drive with a hot coffee in your lap because it could spill, always know what the drivers around you are doing.

And when you're on the phone, you're just not aware.

Anyway, the TLC will have a public hearing on the new rules and will likely vote on them before year-end. And if the rule is passed, cabbies caught three times talking on the phone will have their licenses ripped away.

I predict many people will disagree with me. Feel free to weigh in.

Crazy-old violin returned to flighty musician

Thanks to the tracking/stalker-like power of cabs' GPS, a $500,000, 184-year old violin was returned to its owner.

(FYI - When this violin was built, it took two days to travel from NYC to Boston via Stagecoach. Bet that was comfortable. The rest of the US was busy executing Indians.)

As that violin is worth more than my life, I can't imagine how I'd feel if I'd had one to many to drinks and left it in a cab. Not that the violin's owner, 22-year-old Korean virtuoso Hanh-Bin, did that. But I might. Then I'd freak out and cry.

But Hanh-Bin had the presence of mind to call the taxi authorities and the cops, and the cab's dispatcher tracked it down in no time via the GPS -- it was still in the trunk of the cab Dalbir Singh had driven home to NJ, the New York Post reported.

The couple was happily reunited.

Above is a picture of an 18th century violin which looks suspiciously like a modern-day violin. More impressive is Hanh-Bin's mohawk and eyeliner.