Day 2 of taxi strike brings slow procession protest

On the second day of their strike, taxi drivers started at 11am a slow procession starting from the Barcelona airport down into the Catalan capital towards the sea, and back.

This was decided by representatives of the taxi sector in an assembly which saw over 500 taxi drivers, near the T2 terminal at the Barcelona airport.

Initially, discrepancies had arisen over what protest actions should be taken – the original concept was to carry out the long procession – but the more radical protesters pushed for cutting access to the Port of Barcelona.

The majority of representatives from the taxi sector asked that today be a “peaceful” day although some have claimed that they don’t want to be “politically correct.” This, after the first day of protesting on July 26 brought attacks on Uber and Cabify vehicles by taxi drivers, leading the aforementioned private transport companies to temporarily suspend their services for safety issues. 

Two-day taxi strike

For July 25 and 26, taxi drivers in Barcelona are striking. This, to protest the lifting of a regulation limiting companies like Uber and Cabify, which they see as competition.

This has led to a delicate situation for those helping passengers at the airport. Lorena, an airport employee that coordinates taxis, explained that when informing passengers of options to get to their final destination in the city, there was, of course, Uber and Cabify, but “aren’t authorized to say so,” as otherwise, they’d “have problems.”

The employee continued by saying that this is because some taxi drivers were around the airport, some “dressed normally,” and ended by explaining that they didn’t “want any problems with them.”