The history of taxi in Greece

Thu 03 Feb 2022
The history of taxi in Greece

A a taxi or a cab, is a type of vehicle for hire with a driver, used by a single passenger or small group of passengers, often for a non-shared ride. A taxicab conveys passengers between locations of their choice. This differs from other modes of public transport where the pick-up and drop-off locations are determined by the service provider, not by the passenger, although demand responsive transport and share taxis provide a hybrid bus/taxi mode.

Read more at Wikipedia about the definition and the history of taxi in general.

How it all started

In Greece the first taxi started its engine soon after the large cities were motorized and the car was the main trasportation vehicle. The first taxis in Greece and Athens in particular were illegal taxis where the driver could pick up passengers/clients that suited his or her destination. These taxis became more and more popular as the city grew larger and people needed an alternative to public transportation. After this phenomenon started to take large scale the government decided to act and decided to regulate the taxi industry and issue new laws.

The first legal taxis

The first attempt from the Greek state to regulate the taxi industry in Greece was made in 1964 by the government that gave out 6.200 taxi licenses with the condition that the driver owns a professional driving’s license. After that approximately each decade the Greek government issues new licenses according to the transportation needs and the transfer market growth. After 2003 and until today no new licenses have been issued in order to build a better and more solid regulation framework around the taxi and private transfer industry in the country. 

This seems to be more than crucial in our days since the tourism sector is booming in Greece and more tourists are choosing a taxi in order to get to their final holiday destination.

Different city – Different color

In Greece each major city has a specific taxi color in order to be easier for the passenger which is a legal taxi and which is not. Only licensed and professional taxis are allowed to be colored that way by the Greek law. In Athens the taxis are painted all yellow and in Thessaloniki, which is the second largest city the taxis are painted blue and white. The taxi colors might be different from city to city but the license plates are all the same and must be yellow with black letters and numbers, if this is not the case then it is not a legal taxi. Easy transfer is a taxi company based in Thessaloniki - Greece est. 1982 and since only strives to provide excellent taxi services and transfers from Thessaloniki airport and any other place you might wish.