On Thursday of last week, the DCC changed the late-night taxi stand outside The Terrace bar in the lower Octagon into a five-minute park between 6pm and 7am, with the late-night stand now operating outside the Dunedin Visitor Centre in the upper Octagon.
Taxis are still permitted to use the original stand from 7am to 6pm, but the separate area and times have confused drivers and passengers alike.
A Dunedin Taxis driver said the situation was a mess, with people still lining up outside The Terrace at night.
"We have to move, because he [the bar's owner] wants us gone."
Terrace owner John MacDonald said the decision to move the taxi stand at night was the council's and "it is a policy decision and I have nothing to do with it".
Mr MacDonald said the council had asked him to remove four of his outside tables and glass screens before June 1, which were situated next to the stand.
"I will comply with that, and the taxis have to do the same with this new decision."
The screens were to separate bar patrons from those waiting at the taxi stand to make the area easier to police, he said.
"The council wrote to me telling me the screens would have to go by June 1, but to alleviate the situation the taxis were going. But it is not something I have requested."
The decision to relocate the stand at night was a safety issue raised by the police over six months, and had nothing to do with restaurants, DCC transportation operation manager Mike Costelloe said.
"The police were quite keen for the spot to move, as there had been a few incidents in the area.
"They had trouble differentiating between who were bar patrons and who were taxi-stand patrons", he said.
"We don't change things just because the restaurants want things changed."
The DCC would have preferred to relocate the stand permanently, but the Dunedin Visitor Centre needed the five-minute parks during the day, Mr Costelloe said.
"We have talked with some of the taxi companies about it and while we know some of the drivers were not happy, the companies have been supportive."
While some of Dunedin Taxis' 80 drivers were not happy with the announcement, they had to accept the decision and move on, chairman Bill Collie said.
"But to make sure this works it has to be policed so people don't park in the taxi stand," he said.
Several taxi drivers said customers were not aware of the changes, with late night revellers still queuing at the original stand.
The lack of shelter at the new stand was another problem.
A taxi driver, who worked the late shift, said the position of the new late-night stand meant taxis had to drive across a turning lane to gain entry to the Octagon.
"It doesn't make any sense. There was nothing wrong with having the stand where it was," he said.
A Southern Taxis' driver said taxis did not appear good enough to be parked outside "certain restaurants, but it was all right for us to drop their customers right out front".
