London Black-Cab Crisis Opens Road to Mercedes Minivans: Cars

London’s black taxis, built to the same design for 54 years, are following red phone boxes and Routemaster buses toward extinction as their manufacturer fights bankruptcy. Some cabbies say rival models don’t measure up.

Manganese Bronze Holdings Plc, which has made taxis in Coventry, England, since 1948, entered administration last month after a Chinese tie-up failed to yield savings needed to secure the future and 400 of its cabs, called TX4s, were recalled with steering faults.