Slow lah, Uncle.

Have you noticed nowadays how taxi drivers are driving slowly on the roads. Last time, they will just overtake effortlessly, rev unnecesaary and speed readily, be it when the cabs are hired or empty. Not anymore. Now they seems to be taking their own leisurely time to cruise and sightsee the roads of Singapore.

If you have no idea of what I am talking about, let's put it this way. For my modest 1-litred car to overtake a taxi, I need to be willing to burn some petrol as well as have some good driving skills. Now, overtaking taxis is just the next thing you will do once you have start your engine.

I can only attribute this trend to one factor, THIS:


Rising Oil Price.

Diesel price went up to almost $2 per litre, originally it was less than a dollar. What makes matter worse is that the increase for diesel is a more than proportionate increase as compared with petrol. It has actually come to a level where it is alarmingly close to petrol prices ($1.93 to $2.13 is a mere $0.20 difference)

So last time, taxi drivers could just 'waste fuel' by driving fast because they know that the cost per km is much lesser than passenger cars. Not anymore with today price. With prices as expensive, they are forced to make full use of diesel and drive slowly with the sole intention of increasing fuel economy.

Is it a good thing?