The Taxi
Always in a hurry · Keeper of Times Square
New York's first motor cabs, in 1907, were red and green. Since 1967 the city's licensed cabs have had to be yellow.
The legend
New York's first motor cabs, in 1907, were red and green. Yellow came from Chicago, where John Hertz painted his Yellow Cab fleet after, the story goes, a University of Chicago study named yellow the easiest colour to spot. Some historians doubt the study. In 1967 New York made yellow the law for its licensed cabs.
“I'd hail one and ask for the Empire State.”
Where it comes from
The word taxi is short for taximeter, the fare meter invented in 1891 by the German Friedrich Wilhelm Gustav Bruhn. In July 1897, New York's Electric Carriage and Wagon Company put 12 electric hansom cabs on the streets.
Every yellow cab carries a medallion, a metal licence fixed to its hood. The system began in 1937, when Mayor Fiorello La Guardia signed the Haas Act to limit the number of cabs, and 13,566 medallions were sold for $10 each. Medallions can be bought and sold. One reached about $1.3 million in April 2013, before prices fell as ride-hailing apps arrived. Since 1971 the Taxi and Limousine Commission has run the trade, taking over from the police department's Hack Bureau. For decades the boxy Checker was the classic New York cab; the last one was retired in July 1999.
Where to see it
By law, New York has 13,587 yellow taxis, the only cars allowed to pick up street hails anywhere in the city. Green boro taxis joined them in August 2013. A lit roof light means the cab is free; a dark one means it is taken. The medallion sits on the hood. Since 1996 a new design has come out every two years, and the 2026 medallion, marking 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, carries embossed stars and stripes.
In the game
The taxi's roof light flickers on. The taxi skids, honks twice and keeps going. The taxi pulls over and switches off its roof light.
