Back in October, I had written about NYC’s search for NY-themed apps. The winners were announced recently. The finalists share a common fundamental theme: ease of use and application. Were you ever stuck looking for the nearest subway stop and walked five blocks in the wrong direction? With WayFinder, no mas! The geo-targeting app lets you spot the nearest entrance in one wave of the arm. Big Apple Ed is useful for parents or real estate hunters who want to look up NYC public school. But Taxihack is the quintessential NY app, in my humble opinion. Anyone who’s been to NY, has had a cabby experience. You’re bouncing from one side of the car to the other, your driver insists he knows the way better than you do, there are dubious sticky things on the back of the seat in front of you. But then you’re so happy you found one when it’s raining, when it’s 1AM and you need to go home safely, when you’re in a mad, mad rush or when you have simply too much to carry up and down the subway.
Now you can tweet @taxihack or email alert@taxihack.com and talk about the positives and negatives of your ride. It may be tricky for passengers to match the medallion number to the car when they’re eagerly waving and patiently waiting on the curb, but this new channel give both the passengers and the drivers room to vent!
The app is still new, so I would expect the next iterations to organize information by neighborhood or by cabby number. Yet, the lost and found section is not cluttered and is pretty practical if you’ve left anything behind or looking for a particular passenger.