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Stapleton (taxi zone 221) is Staten Island's third-busiest zone, with about 1,037 pickups a day. It also has the island's shortest app trips and lowest pay per trip: a median of 2.27 miles and $10.57 driver pay. Almost a quarter of its rides go one zone over, to St. George. And it has the island's biggest gap between trips starting and ending: 69,473 more pickups than drop-offs in a year.
Source: TLC trip records for yellow taxis, green cabs and high-volume apps (Uber, Lyft), September 2025 to August 2026, totaled by TLC Help. Non-app black car and livery trips are not included.
Zone 221 at a glance
Stapleton's neighbors on TLC's map are Saint George/New Brighton (206), West Brighton (245), Grymes Hill/Clifton (115) and Arrochar/Fort Wadsworth (6). TLC calls it a "Boro Zone"; that is a category in its data, not a legal line (zones explained).
When rides start
Weekday pickups hit about 88 in the 8 a.m. hour, then fall to about 70 at 9 a.m. and stay between about 49 and 64 until 6 p.m. Weekend afternoons are busy too: about 67 an hour around 2–3 p.m. on Saturdays and 55 on Sundays. Drop-offs peak later on weekdays, at about 57 an hour from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. On Saturdays the busiest hour for drop-offs is 7 p.m. (about 58).
Month by month
App pickups ranged from 27,440 in September 2025 to 35,036 in March 2026. Yellow taxis made 31 to 76 pickups a month, with the most in December 2025 (76).
Where trips go
24.0% of Stapleton pickups end in Saint George/New Brighton and 17.0% stay in Stapleton. Next are Grymes Hill/Clifton (9.3%), Arrochar/Fort Wadsworth (6.1%) and Bloomfield/Emerson Hill (5.1%). All ten top destinations are Staten Island zones.
Coming in, Stapleton itself (20.8%) and St. George (20.7%) supply about the same share of drop-offs. The two zones form one short-trip market. A driver bouncing between them will see many rides, but each one pays little.
Fares and pay
The median app trip from Stapleton is 2.27 miles and 10.5 minutes, with a $13.41 fare and $10.57 driver pay, all the lowest on Staten Island. Tips average $0.61 (3.1% of the fare). Pay per engaged hour is $66.21, but that number only counts time with a rider. The time spent driving to each next pickup isn't counted.
Yellow taxis made 631 pickups, more than any Staten Island zone except Arrochar/Fort Wadsworth. Their median trip was 6.73 miles, 22.9 minutes and $28.19 on the meter, much longer than the typical app ride, and 15.2% of them were charged the Congestion Relief Zone fee, against 1.9% of app pickups.
Rules for working Stapleton
- App drivers may only accept base-dispatched trips. Picking up someone who waves you down is a violation of 80-19(c)(1), with fines and possible suspension for repeat violations (Chapter 80).
- Yellow taxis and green cabs may take hails; Stapleton is in TLC's Hail Zone (Chapter 51). Full table in who can pick up where.
- Nearest taxi stand: the island's only signed one is in St. George, at the ferry terminal (see zone 206). DOT lists no relief stands on Staten Island (vqu8-xef9, checked October 12, 2026).
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.
- Stapleton: trip facts by sector — Key trip facts for taxi zone 221 (Stapleton, Staten Island) 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.
- Stapleton: when trips start, by hour — Average pickups per day in each hour in zone 221, 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.
- Stapleton: pickups by month — Trips starting in taxi zone 221 (Stapleton, Staten Island) each month, by sector.NYC TLC Trip Record Data (yellow, green, high-volume FHV), Sep 2025 – Aug 2026 · pulled Oct 12, 2026
- Stapleton: where trips from here go — Top drop-off zones for trips starting in zone 221, 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 378,637 pickups. 'Outside NYC' = zone 265.
- Stapleton: where trips to here come from — Top pickup zones for trips ending in zone 221, 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 309,164 drop-offs.
- Stapleton: when trips arrive, by hour — Average drop-offs per day in each hour in zone 221, 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).
- Stapleton: drop-offs by month — Trips ending in taxi zone 221 (Stapleton, Staten Island) 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 busy is Stapleton for app drivers?
Busy for Staten Island: 378,637 pickups from September 2025 to August 2026, about 1,037 a day, 3rd of the island's 20 zones. Apps made 377,999 of them.
Why is pay per trip low in Stapleton?
Trips are the shortest on Staten Island: a median of 2.27 miles and 10.5 minutes. The median app fare is $13.41 and median driver pay $10.57 before tips, both the lowest on the island.
Where do rides from Stapleton go?
24.0% go to Saint George/New Brighton next door and 17.0% stay in Stapleton. Grymes Hill/Clifton takes 9.3%.
Do yellow taxis pick up in Stapleton?
Some do: 631 yellow pickups in 12 months, the second most of any Staten Island zone. The median yellow trip was 6.73 miles with a $28.19 metered fare.
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 (PDF) nyc.gov
- TLC Rules Chapter 80: Rules Applicable to All Drivers (PDF) nyc.gov
- NYC Open Data: Taxi and FHV Relief Stands (DOT, vqu8-xef9) 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.