Yellow Cab Crisis Attracts National & International Media Attention. Will the NYC Yellow Taxi Survive?

The yellow cab crisis is beginning to attract the attention of national and international news organizations, with Al Jazeera & Yahoo recently publishing articles on the topic

While many people in NYC, especially the TLC community, know the details of the yellow cab medallion debt crisis, it’s noteworthy that the story is getting some prominent national and international media attention. I say this because the more attention the story gets, especially from larger media outlets, the tougher it becomes for politicians/governments not to act. In addition, the story of the current crisis comes on the back of an already ongoing pre-pandemic crisis documented by the NY Times’ Brian M. Rosenthal, who won a Pulitzer Prize detailing the troubling backstory of medallion loans made to TLC drivers. A perfect storm hit the industry twice, first the rise of Uber & Lyft and now the pandemic. It inevitably leads to one question: Will the iconic NYC yellow cab survive?

As I’ve reported several times, the New York Taxi Workers Alliance (NYTWA), led by Bhairavi Desai, is lobbying for a debt restructuring plan that would cap all medallion loans at $125,000 and significantly re…