Abstract:
The scope of the study was to ascertain the viability of the cruise taxi business in Francistown
metropolis. The business is dominated by black entrepreneurs supported by local authority to
ply the metropolitan routes. A semi-structured questionnaire was introduced and issued to
commuters who were randomly selected on their way to pick a taxi at their terminus. Collected
data were analysed using IBM SPSS Statistics ver. 26. A Cruise taxi driver’s level of education
influenced time taken to pick and drop off passengers, commuting market choice and Saturday
income (P<0.05). Passengers were found to be satisfied and willingly preferred using cruise
ride taxis. Day of the week significantly influenced various parameters including breakdown
expenditure, number of vacant seats and ranking time (P<0.05) with a toll on viability. The
cruise ride business was inferred to be viable and efficient considering they earned more than
other sectors of the economy and they sat on the average income earned across all sectors. The
cruise taxis in the metropolis generated revenue of BWP 48 million per year. It is recommended
the cruise taxi business embrace evolving technologies like e-hailing systems to enhance
viability. This will enable real time data collection to analyse their business as well as
comparing it at global level.
