26. Taxi Stand 1980s

Architect Unknown

Bus Routes 011, 032, 034, 052, 054, 056

The Taxi Stand is easily identified as the scrawny younger brother of the adjoining Bus Terminal. Despite being colored in the same divisive turquoise, the two are, ultimately, very different structures housing very different systems. The Bus Terminal is ticketed; the Taxi Stand is not. The Bus Terminal has an information desk; the Taxi Stand relies on crowd-sourced information. The buses run promptly; the mini-vans leave when they are full. The buses are clearly marked with their destination; the mini-vans are all the same white, and destinations are signposted by men yelling from different parts of the Stand.

Like the Terminal, the Taxi Stand was painted in the 1990s in a rebranding initiative by the Department of Transport. While its original white was perhaps more emblematically modernist, the turquoise is both playful and iconic. Around noon on clear days, the image of sharp turquoise lines against the pale blue sky is majestic.

The Taxi Stand is mostly hidden away from the street, concealed on two sides by a large billboard, and on another by a line of trees. The space is entirely open air (with the exception of the two small rotunda-shaped buildings that sit off to the side). The space is enclosed in four separate islands, each hosting an identical structure. Like an opened drawbridge, the roofing of each structure slants upwards, leaving a small gap in between. The rigidity of the roof’s lines is complemented by the deep curves of its base. A tree stands between the two planks of the roofing, in the middle of each of the islands. Each tree is surrounded by a number of benches, and there are other benches facing one another. This is meant to be a social space.

Common color and design, and the small gaps between the buildings, give the four structures a sense of continuity and harmony. By the edge of the compound, facing the line of trees, are the two rotundas. One houses a restaurant, and the other an office.

Waiting and stasis define the experience of the Taxi Stand and its architectural purpose. Drivers lounge on benches, waiting for passengers to trickle in. Passengers stand around alongside half-empty vans waiting to travel to different parts of the UAE. The lazy yells of "Dubai, Dubai" and "Sharjah, Sharjah" are carried through the structure.

Unlike other bilingual signs in the city, stop signs are written only in Arabic (quff), an indication of the age of the stand, but also of the lack of upkeep in the area. Aside from the occasional police car that circles through, the Taxi Stand is mostly a self-organizing entity.

The curves of the pillars, the spikes that subtly line the edges of the roof, and the sharp angles of the roof itself are architecturally stimulating. Yet the real delight of the building is in the spaces it creates. The roof’s brise-soleil filters dampened light into the covered area below, and the turquoise is soothing. The arching roof structure, from less than two meters at its edges to around six meters at its apex, evokes both spaciousness and coziness. From the sight of lounging Pakistani drivers, it is clear that the space has become homely.

Plans have surfaced recently that call for the demolition of the Taxi Stand and the Bus Terminal, and for the development of a newly designed complex. The certainty of these plans is unclear. A Pakistani driver told me, gesturing to the Taxi Stand, "If this goes, I won’t have a job." The complete renovation of the area would almost certainly displace the current informal system and the people it employs. It would jeopardize a structure that celebrates shape as a way of playfully reinventing space, endanger the space itself, and threaten the community that has made that space its own.