He’s in Step With the ‘Taxi Dance’

Scott Rinehart was a novice taxi driver when he picked up his first “runner,” a customer who jumps from the cab on arrival and disappears without paying.

But the 37-year-old Lake Forest resident has such a winning personality, the man felt compelled to give him a tip before fleeing.

“That’s the really strange thing about it--he tipped me. I picked him up at the Ralphs off Culver and the 5 Freeway and I took him to downtown Santa Ana, 17th and Grand. All the way there, I was talking with him, and by the time we got there he said, ‘Hey, you’re a really nice guy, and you know, if I hadn’t got paid today, you probably wouldn’t get anything.’

“I thought he was talking about the taxi fare. I didn’t realize he was going to tip me and run. So I stop with this guy and he says, ‘Hey man, I really appreciate your conversation.’ The guy handed me $2, and it was a $25 run. I opened the door and got out, but there was no sign of the guy. He totally took me by surprise.

“Now, I’m a lot more mature cab driver. I would have spotted that coming a mile away.”

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More camp counselor than cab driver in demeanor, Rinehart has been driving a taxi since 1990. He’d been a cook at several popular Orange County eateries, but his experience and training as a mechanic led to a more lucrative career as a refrigeration repairman. While moving a heavy piece of equipment, he injured his elbow and ended up out of work and temporarily disabled.

“A neighbor who was driving a cab told me that it was lucrative and you meet interesting people. He was pretty convincing. It was around Christmastime and I needed the money, so I went down to Orange County Yellow Cab and they hired me that day.”

Rinehart has since worked for four Orange County-based cab companies, spending the last year covering South County for California Yellow Cab. He pays $550 a week to lease his 1993 Chevy Caprice Classic--a retired police car with about 140,000 miles on the odometer.

“Most taxis were police cars,” said Rinehart, who wears black wraparound sunglasses and listens to a Madonna cassette between passengers. “These cars last longer and are pretty basic under the hood, so you don’t have as much that can go wrong. Some of these cars do not get turned off for more than an hour a day.”

Even while talking, he listens intently to his two-way radio, listening for the dispatcher to call for a cab in his area.

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His taxi is equipped with police-issue door locks that enable the driver to lock a passenger in the back seat, a feature Rinehart said he will not hesitate to use if he spots another runner.

For the first three years of his career, Rinehart drove from 5 p.m. to 5 a.m., working in some of the most dangerous parts of Orange County. Instead of leasing his cab and keeping the fare, he was paid a portion of each fare. The pressure was on to pick up every call, even if the situation seemed unsafe.

Now, he averages about eight hours and 300 miles a day, seven days a week, driving a lot of Leisure World residents to shopping centers and back. After expenses, Rinehart figures he clears about $1,000 a week.

“I don’t drive the night shift anymore. The day shift is much more pleasant. After 10 o’clock at night the clientele changes; you get people who are drunk, panicked, involved in fights, domestic violence--it’s a negative thing. A different crowd comes out after dark.”

He loves his cab and is very particular about who drives it during his off-hours. He subleases the car to other drivers at night, but he insists they uphold his high standards, part of the reputation he says he is building for cab #634.

“If they don’t take care of my car or my customers, they never drive this cab again,” he said.

Rinehart has never been robbed and says such encounters are relatively rare for Orange County cab drivers. But drivers sometimes rob from each other by answering each other’s calls.

“It’s very competitive. There are other companies where drivers will use a radio scanner to take your call. They hear it and they go for it. But my boss would fire me if I did that.

“We pick up at the Ritz-Carlton in Laguna all the time and almost every call from the Ritz-Carlton is worth $50. If somebody hears that there’s a call coming out of the Ritz-Carlton, you’d better bet they’re going to do their best to get up there before the other cab.”

But picking up someone who is doing the “taxi dance” is considered fair game, Rinehart said.

“The taxi dance is when you drive up on somebody who is looking for a ride, and you can always tell. They’re waving their arms, dancing around and making eye contact--that’s the taxi dance. Some of those people have already called a cab, but they don’t care who comes. They just want the first cab who comes. If you drive by, the people are going to get in your cab.

“You don’t have to be a brain surgeon to drive a cab. But the key thing is to have a good sense of direction and a lot of common sense, because you must have the ability to recognize the taxi dance. If you drive by and don’t see it, you’re losing money.”

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Profile: Scott Rinehart

Age: 37

Hometown: Dallas, Texas

Residence: Lake Forest

Family: Wife, Jacquelyn; five children

Education: Norco High School; graduated from the Arizona Automotive Institute; trained as a jet engine mechanic in the Air Force; studied at various culinary schools

Background: Restaurant cook and kitchen manager for seven years; refrigeration mechanic for four years; began driving cabs in 1990 and has since worked for Orange County Yellow Cab, Express Yellow Cab, West Coast Yellow Cab and California Yellow Cab

On hacking: “I am the next-generation cab driver. I am smart enough to have a conversation and be clean-cut enough to not scare the customer out of the cab. This is becoming a very legitimate job.”

Source: Scott Rinehart; Researched by RUSS LOAR / For The Times