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South Jamaica, TLC taxi zone 215, sends riders out in the morning on very short trips. 822,644 trips started here from September 2025 to August 2026, about 2,254 a day, 22nd of Queens' 69 zones. Almost a quarter of weekday pickups start between 7 and 10 a.m., and 28.2% of all trips end in neighbouring Jamaica. Because trips are so short, the median app fare and driver pay per trip are near the bottom of Queens.
South Jamaica at a glance (zone 215)
TLC's lookup table calls zone 215 a Queens "Boro Zone", a label for sorting trip records rather than a legal area. Its five neighbours are Jamaica, Baisley Park, Saint Albans, South Ozone Park and Richmond Hill. About 113,000 more trips start here than end here (822,644 against 709,830).
A morning-rush zone
Weekday pickups climb from about 81 in the 5 a.m. hour and 129 at 6 a.m. to about 216 at 8 a.m. After 9 a.m. they settle at about 65–130 an hour for the rest of the day, with a small bump at 2 p.m. The evening is the arrival time: weekday drop-offs peak at 5 p.m., with 26.7% of them between 4 and 8 p.m. Weekends are flatter and peak in the early afternoon (2 p.m. Saturday, 1 p.m. Sunday).
Volume grew during the year. Pickups went from 60,421 in September 2025 to a high of 75,183 in March 2026 and stayed around 69,000–71,000 a month in the summer, about 10.6% above the fall. Twelve months of data are too few to call that a lasting trend.
Next door to Jamaica
More than a quarter of trips go to Jamaica (28.2%). After that come South Jamaica itself (7.8%), South Ozone Park (5.7%), Saint Albans (5.4%) and Baisley Park (4.8%). JFK takes 3.9% and 3.8% end outside New York City. Trips into South Jamaica come mostly from Jamaica too (26.6% of drop-offs). Only 1% of app pickups paid the Congestion Relief Zone charge, 66th of 69 Queens zones.
Short trips, low pay per trip
Apps carried 807,222 riders here (98.1%), with 14,844 yellow and 578 green pickups making up the rest. Half of all app rides were shorter than 2.06 miles and 12.1 minutes. That gives a median fare of $13.57 (68th of 69 Queens zones) and driver pay of $11.12 before tips (67th). Riders tipped just 1.4% of the fare, $0.26 on average. Pay per engaged hour, $60.28, is close to other Queens zones, because short trips also end fast; it does not count time waiting for the next request.
If you want to check a short trip against the TLC minimum pay rate, use the pay estimator.
Yellow taxis serve a very different trip here: a median of 10 miles, 32.5 minutes and $39.34, and 10.3% of yellow pickups paid the Congestion Relief Zone charge. Yellow pickups dropped from about 1,300–1,600 a month to 644–723 a month from June 2026.
Pickup rules
South Jamaica is in TLC's Hail Zone (Chapter 51). A yellow or green cab may stop for a hail here. A for-hire driver, including Uber and Lyft, may pick up only through a booking from a licensed base (80-19(c)(1)). DOT's relief-stand and parking-sign data showed no relief stand or taxi-stand sign inside zone 215 when we checked on 2026-10-12; the closest taxi-stand signs are in Jamaica. See who can pick up where.
Nearby zones
Data on this page
Aggregates of public data. They describe trips and vehicles, never individual people.
Aggregated by TLC Help from TLC trip records, Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 (pickup date; TLC publishes trip files about two months after the month ends and may revise them). 'App' = high-volume for-hire services (Uber, Lyft). Taxi records with a negative fare (reversals) are excluded. Averages, medians and rates use 'clean' trips only: 1 minute to 4 hours, more than 0 and under 150 miles, fare above $0 and under $1,000. 'Fare' is the metered fare_amount for taxis and base_passenger_fare for app trips — before tolls, tips, taxes and surcharges — so it is not what the passenger paid in total. App driver_pay is TLC's 'total driver pay (not including tolls or tips and net of commission, surcharges, or taxes)'. Tips are separate. 'Per engaged hour' divides pay by passenger time only (pickup to drop-off). It leaves out time driving to pickups and waiting for requests, so real hourly earnings are lower; it is not the TLC minimum-pay formula. Monthly cells with 1–9 trips are shown as blank (null). Pairs with fewer than 10 trips are not listed.
- South Jamaica: trip facts by sector — Key trip facts for taxi zone 215 (South Jamaica, Queens) by sector, 12 months.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Taxi tips: tip_amount records credit-card tips only (cash tips are not recorded), so taxi tip rates use credit-card trips (payment_type 1). App tips are the tips field on every trip. Tip rate = tips ÷ fare. Medians and rates need at least 250 trips in the cell (else blank); counts of 1–9 are blank. Pickup-side stats (fare, pay, tips) describe trips that START here.
- South Jamaica: when trips start, by hour — Average pickups per day in each hour in zone 215, on weekdays, Saturdays and Sundays (all sectors).NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Average over all such days in the window, holidays included.
- South Jamaica: pickups by month — Trips starting in taxi zone 215 (South Jamaica, Queens) each month, by sector.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026
- South Jamaica: where trips from here go — Top drop-off zones for trips starting in zone 215, as a share of all its pickups (12 months, all sectors).NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Out of 822,644 pickups. 'Outside NYC' = zone 265.
- South Jamaica: where trips to here come from — Top pickup zones for trips ending in zone 215, as a share of all its drop-offs (12 months, all sectors).NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Out of 709,830 drop-offs.
- South Jamaica: when trips arrive, by hour — Average drop-offs per day in each hour in zone 215, on weekdays, Saturdays and Sundays (all sectors; hour of pickup).NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Hour is the trip's pickup hour (TLC records both, but a trip is binned by when it started).
- South Jamaica: drop-offs by month — Trips ending in taxi zone 215 (South Jamaica, Queens) each month, by sector.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026
- All 263 taxi zones: trips and key facts (map-ready) — One row per TLC taxi zone (LocationID 1–263) with pickups, drop-offs, sector mix, app driver pay, fares and tip rates — the source for zone maps, hubs and the zone explorer.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026Medians/rates need ≥250 trips (else null). labels are LocationIDs as strings; zones[] has names, boroughs, service_zone (from taxi_zone_lookup.csv), suggested slugs and neighbouring zone ids (shared boundary, from taxi_zones.zip).
Frequently asked questions
How many rides start in South Jamaica?
TLC trip records show 822,644 pickups in zone 215 from September 2025 to August 2026, about 2,254 a day, 22nd of Queens' 69 zones. Fewer trips end here: 709,830.
Where do South Jamaica riders go?
Mostly to Jamaica, next door: 28.2% of all pickups end there. 7.8% stay in South Jamaica, and South Ozone Park, Saint Albans and Baisley Park take about 5% each.
Why do app trips from South Jamaica pay less?
They are short. The median app trip is 2.06 miles and 12.1 minutes, so the median fare ($13.57) and driver pay ($11.12) are among the lowest in Queens. Pay per engaged hour ($60.28) is close to other Queens zones.
When is South Jamaica busiest?
Weekday mornings. About 216 pickups start in the 8 a.m. hour, and 24.7% of weekday pickups start between 7 and 10 a.m. Weekends peak in the early afternoon.
Sources
Last reviewed against the official sources on .
- NYC TLC Trip Record Data nyc.gov
- TLC Taxi Zone Lookup Table d37ci6vzurychx.cloudfront.net
- TLC Rules, Chapter 51 (Definitions) nyc.gov
- TLC Rules, Chapter 80 (Drivers) nyc.gov
- NYC Open Data: Taxi and FHV Relief Stands (DOT, vqu8-xef9) data.cityofnewyork.us
- NYC Open Data: Parking Regulation Locations and Signs (DOT, nfid-uabd) data.cityofnewyork.us
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TLC Help is not a law firm and is not affiliated with the NYC Taxi & Limousine Commission or OATH. Explanations on this site are general information, not legal advice. Legal representation is provided by independent attorneys and OATH-registered representatives in our network.