Formentera's Office of Transport meets with taxi drivers' association and local businesses

The president of the Formentera Island Council, Jaume Ferrer, and the councilor of Tourism, Trade and Transport, Alejandra Ferrer, met this morning with the Taxi Drivers' Assocation of Formentera, the Association of Hotels and the Small and Medium-Sized Business Association, in what was to be the start of a path toward consensus with the private sector regarding options to improve public and private transport in summer.

The encounter was the first in a process to reach consensus on improvements to the island's transport services; the management of vehicle fleets; a calendar of periodic sectoral meetings; the number of seasonal taxi licenses that should be offered as well as the time and physical conditions necessary to establishing a quality transport service on the island.

The Formentera Council's Office of Transport requested that participating sectors meet with their associate members while a second meeting in October is organised. Additionally, participants committed to drafting a text enumerating problems and possible solutions to be debated at the encounter in October.

Meanwhile, in the interest of creating drafts of different proposals that will later be presented to the sector, the Council is in the process of overseeing legal reports to investigate its options in the granting of taxi licenses.

The goal of the encounter was to gather information and suggestions from those sectors that are implicated in transport on Formentera in order to eliminate current deficiencies looking ahead to next summer. It is hoped that a draft of proposals will be prepared by December, which would allow for their application by 1 May.

Until present, the Council's remit in the concession of temporary licenses was not clear. In 2005, a decree was adopted to transfer the responsibility of temporary license concessions to the Island Councils. At that point, these responsibilities were adopted by the now non-existent Eivissa and Formentera Council. In 2012 the Govern Balear announced it would transfer the duty of temporary license concession to the municipalities of Eivissa but failed to specify protocol in the case of Formentera.

Faced with this situation, the Office of Transport of Formentera requested that the Department of Transport in Palma determine if our local council could grant taxi licenses. The Govern's reply was affirmative.

On numerous occasions both the Taxi Drivers Association and the Association of Hotels have decried deficiencies in the taxi service during the high season and requested an increase in licences. The current fleet is composed of 24 taxis and at this juncture the only topic of discussion was a progressive increase of this number, although no specific number was mentioned.

This morning's encounter will mark the beginning of a process of consensus-seeking. Sharing the task of creating a positive image of Formentera as a tourist destination, all the affected sectors are equally implicated in tourism and the task of offering the best services for our island's visitors.