It’s hard to find a stretch of Tokyo’ streets that doesn’t have a taxi in it. Hunter Skipworth and Alfie Goodrich explore the charm of the ubiquitous Tokyo cab.

Words: Hunter Skipworth
Photos: Alfie Goodrich

This piece was originally featured in Metropolis magazine, Tokyo: September, 2007. The photos were also featured in Auto Salon Magazine [Australia] and Torque Magazine [Singapore]

Tokyo is a city governed by speed. Shinkansen slice through its heart while metro’s dissect its underbelly. But these are faceless methods of transport, identity lost in the constant hustle and bustle of Japan’s capital city. The characters of Tokyo are its taxis, ferries of the night that trawl through its neon soaked streets.

To some they are simply another method of getting from A to B, or a safe journey home from a night out. To the drivers themselves it is a livelihood, one far different to the average Japanese worker. The underground world of the Tokyo taxi driver is a complex one, full of all the quirks and qualms that you can expect in Japan. Just as Tokyo itself has grown, so has the role of the taxi driver; those select few capable of negotiating the cities labyrinth of nameless streets and alleys becoming ever more relied on. For many drivers their world is under threat, with no more sleepy cigarette breaks in the back of their cabs and hiking gas prices damaging there fares. Even so, they continue to soldier on, trundling through the city’s streets day at night, keeping Shinjuku busy and Shibuya even busier.

The average taxi driver works hard even for a Japanese man, many cabs not having their engines turned off for several days. No surprise then that Tokyo’s back alleys are often full of sleeping cabbies, presumably those who have made the decision to give their workhorses a rest. It isn’t rare for a driver to start a 9:00 AM and burn on through right ’till 4 o’clock the next morning. Short sharp breaks and plenty of coffee stopping them from shutting down, with their bodies being far less efficient than their cabs.

Rarely will a taxi owner inform you of his love for his job, one recent journey my driver told me “I don’t enjoy a single aspect of my occupation.” Even so their cabs are a veritable Alladin’s cave of goodies, some with TV’s, mobile phone chargers and the inevitable GPS (some of which seem to have never been used). Taxi’s don’t seem to have escaped Japan’s love for customisation and each driver takes pride in whatever treats he has lying inside his cab. So much so in fact that many cab companies have had to ban cab accessories, leaving many taxi hobbyist’s pride and joy exactly the same as all the other drivers in Tokyo.

But this is only the tip of the iceberg. For the average Japanese man, the taxi driver is not much more important than his vehicle. The gradually decreasing status of the Tokyo taxi is leading to more and more customers pushing the boundaries of legality. A taxi rank owner informed me that some Japanese will happily bribe cab drivers to carry out illegal activities. Some even being expected to steal for their customers. “I get a lot of people having sex in my cab,” said one driver, “we aren’t scared, if people are bad we kick them out.” It is common for a taxi to drive right past you if they don’t like the look of you.

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With such as stressful job many drivers like to have a quick drink before they start work. The problem is that it isn’t always a quick drink, some turning up for shifts drunk or hungover from the previous nights adventures. As the situation of the taxi driver has worsened, so has the drink problem. Many taxi ranks are being forced to introduce breathalysers, only handing over the driver his keys once the machine produces a valid alcohol free score.

The taxi rank is very much the taxi drivers second home. It is where they take their vehicles to get repaired, where they pick up their keys and where they stock up on coffee and cigarettes before another week long driving session. What is incredible is just how tough their vehicles are, “they don’t break” said one proud owner. Many will try and keep visits to the rank to a minimum, attempting to push their vehicles to the very limit so the most money can be made. It is commonplace for cabs to only spend 11 or 12 days a year in a rank, usually when drivers take a short break from their endless work. Some of the older taxis coming in for repairs will easily have clocked up 80000 miles. A massive amount when you bear in mind the fact they rarely leave Tokyo’s busy inner city streets

With all this hard work you would expect the driver to take home a decent wad of cash. Daily takings average about 50,000 yen. Ten years ago drivers were making a lot more but as the city has grown ever more efficient less people are making use of its taxis. The recent raise in minimum fare has done even more damage. Often drivers are making 5 or 10% less a day, thus even longer hours of work are required if drivers are to make the same kind of money they used to. The steady increase in gas prices has simply made the situation even more difficult. The group of fisherman that went on strike in Osaka recently because of petrol prices certainly hasn’t gone unnoticed amongst Tokyo’s drivers: ” it is very difficult with the new increases in gas”.

The last ten years has seen a drastic change in the city’s taxis. There has been a large number of taxi companies opening, many offering customers different incentives to get the edge over the competition. The sheer number of new businesses meant that often money and taxation was becoming too complex a process for the government to deal with, thus minimum fares and standards were introduced across the board. That’s not to say that the competition isn’t still there. A select group of the cities drivers carry the three star symbol on the top of their cab. A system unique to one company, customers of a ‘three star’ driver can expect a very high level of service. Prior to the total smoking ban in cabs some companies would use smoking as their main marketing tool. But for all the different niceties of each company one thing is for sure, the Tokyo taxi driver is extremely proud of his job. Every driver will do his best to get you somewhere, even if he has to resort to his GPS system, something which happens all too often.

Entry into the world of the Tokyo taxi is pretty straightforward. It is often a job that people resort to on losing another. A 40 question exam on the cities layout has to be taken and obviously a clean driving record is required. Otherwise that’s it, “there is plenty of people to take the job” one rank owner explained. Something made ever more clear when a night is spent in Shibuya; there are just so many taxi’s in Tokyo. Once a driver has passed his exam, he joins one of the cities many companies, picks up his keys and starts the never ending drive that is his job.
Japanese people love to smoke but taxi drivers love it even more.

The recent smoking ban in cabs has caused real problems amongst the cities drivers. Long journeys now see taxis stopping for cigarette breaks, both for driver and customer. Large tips are sometimes offered if the driver will allow their passenger to have a cheeky cigarette in the back. “Its bad for our health but I still like smoking” says one driver as he slyly lights up a cigarette in his cab. Nearly 450 Government officials recently got in trouble for taking gifts and favours from the cities taxis. Smoking in cabs being one on the list. Much higher on the list was cold beer and in some cases even money. As long as officials stuck to one company the prezzies would keep on coming. Amazingly as much as $20000 dollars worth of goodies was taken by one official over a five year period.

For the proud taxi owner August 1st is the day to be out driving in Ginza. The Japanese obsession with celebration seems not to have been lost on the cities taxis. National taxi day in Ginza celebrates the assumed date of the original Tokyo taxi. Although after spending a while with a bunch of the cities drivers most of them reckon the date to be made up, more just another celebration.

Next time you get in a cab, take your time to think about the epic amount of work that the driver goes through to help keep Tokyo running at a million miles an hour. Take advantage of the fact you are not in some faceless ultra train tearing across the city. Chat to him, I am pretty sure each driver will have a different story ever more bizarre than the last. Above all, enjoy the fact that the neon lights and people of Tokyo aren’t rushing by your window. Take it all in, the only way to really get your head round this city at night is by taxi. And for every twist and turn and each time a journey comes to an end, remember the driver probably has hours more to do.

The world of the Tokyo taxi is indeed a strange one, one in which the boundaries between night and day are blurred by coffee and cigarettes. One of neon nights and drowsy days. But perhaps most importantly it is one under threat by the ever growing infinite urban sprawl that is Tokyo.