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These two ads from the 1914 Winnipeg telephone book show that some cab operators were beginning to use standard passenger cars in preference to limousine and town car models or purpose-built taxis. The City Hall Stand Auto Livery ad boasts an elegant limousine, but the McMurray's Auto Livery fleet is equipped with ordinary touring cars.

Source:

Manitoba Government Telephones, Official Telephone Directory, No. 21, December, 1914, Classified Business Directory p. 3.

Winnipeg Cab History / 51

Jitneys (3)

In Winnipeg, as elsewhere, individual jitney operators banded together, pooling resources for dispatch services and advertising. In 1915 there was a jitney association and two jitney dispatch services that people could call when they needed rides.

For a while there was even an International Jitney Association with chapters in Canada. It published a monthly magazine called "The Jitney Bus".

The jitney strategy of independent owner-operators acting cooperatively and pooling resources anticipated the business model followed by Winnipeg's two largest present day taxi concerns, Duffy's and Unicity.