UPDATE (6/4/2016): A pertinent, well-written comment (take notes everyone) from a taxi driver who works for one of the decent Bucharest taxi companies, Speed, has shed some light on what is really going on at Otopeni, and why the cheaper taxis have all but disappeared:

You are all getting it wrong. I work as a taxi driver for one of those decent companies, Speed. The real reason we didn’t want to have those badges isn’t the LPG tank or the criminal record. Most of the taxis in Bucharest running on LPG have the tanks replacing their spare wheels. Also, most of the drivers have clean records. While introducing this new set of rules, that I agree with, they also wanted to make some money on our back. With no clear reason at all, if you want to have a badge and be allowed at the arrivals, you have to pay a fee of 100 euros for 6 months. That fee has to be payed by the driver. You could imagine that paying for that badge is not worth for any driver using the 1,39 price. So we rather go back to Bucharest empty. That is the real reason for all the mess.

Now, is anyone still prepared to tell us that this isn’t all about getting the cheaper taxis out of the way?

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Some great mind at Bucharest’s only airport, clearly distressed that it had become too easy for visitors to the Romanian capital to get themselves a cheap ride into town, has effectively decided that any taxi which runs on liquid gas (GPL) can no longer pick up passengers at Otopeni Henri Coanda (the rules are in fact about the size of the boot, which should be 500 litres, but it is clearly Dacia Logans with GPL fitted in the boot that are being targeted). What’s more, taxis which can still go to the airport now need to get a special badge saying so. With little warning, the new rules came into force on April 1st.

Now, given that more than 80 per cent of Bucharest’s taxis are Dacia Logans running on GPL, you do not need to be a genius in logic to realise the consequences: it is now almost impossible to get a taxi at Bucharest airport, at least one charging a fair price. As you would expect, almost all of the decent taxi companies have collectively said ‘bugger this’ and are now giving the airport a wide berth.

This was the scene yesterday at the automated machines which dispense the tickets for taxis, captured by a visiting journo, Andrew MacDowall:

Long vv slow prepaid taxi queue at #Bucharest OTP. Surely a better way to do this @BUC_Airports @RomaniaTourism. pic.twitter.com/okegznzGgi — Andrew MacDowall (@andrewmacdowall) April 4, 2016

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What is the official reason given for the new rule?

Well, the airport authorities have apparently said that the GPL tanks (which are usually mounted in the boots of cars) do not leave the required 500 room for luggage.

Certainly, a family of four with lots of luggage may not get all their bags in the boot of a car with GPL fitted. But surely the way to solve this is simply to have an option on the taxi dispensing machines allowing those few travellers with loads of bags to request a car with a big boot? Why prevent 80 per cent of Bucharest’s taxis from picking-up at the airport?

This comment somewhat gives the game away:

The machines which allow you to order a taxi rather than be forced to take one from the lower level have been well and truly interfered with. The consequence is that at certain times of the day you can only get taxis at 3.49lei/km rather than 1.39lei/km. For example, I wasted 20 minutes on last Friday afternoon at 3pm trying to get a cheaper taxi – no-one was able to get any at this price, only at 3.49 lei/km.

We don’t really need to add anything to that.

The solution (which KP also mentions in his comment) is to go back in time a few years to when Otopeni was a crap airport (oh, hang on) and employ the old trick of walking through to Departures and getting into a taxi as it drops departing passengers off. They are technically not allowed to do this, but few will object. You can even tell the driver to leave the metre off and just agree on a price (35 lei to the city centre should do it, 40 lei if you’re feeling generous). That way they are covered if the police stop them as they make their way out of the airport (this often happens).

Now, if Bucharest were a normal city of course you could use one of several highly efficient public transport services to get into the city centre. Given that the Romanian capital has been appallingly run since forever, and that the idea of making life as easy as possible for visitors to (and residents of) the city is seen as modern, western, decadent, a bit gay and the kind of thing George Soros would no doubt approve of, Bucharest instead says ‘fuck off’ to one and all. The only viable public transport option is therefore an unreliable, horribly overcrowded and painfully slow bus.

Bucharest. Going backwards since 1459.

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