Faint praise for D.C."s taxicabs of the future: "They're not that ugly." This tableau, at the bottom of an escalator in the Walter E. Washington Convention Center, is just four cars. These cars represent the future of D.C."s cityscape. They represent our municipal identity and our unwillingness to be compared with that self-aggrandizing megalopolis up north. (Or maybe our desire to be like New York. They could represent that as well). They represent ideas of beauty, and how beauty looks when displayed on a sedan barrelling down Connecticut Avenue. These cars are about all of those things. For now they're mostly about dubiousness. A woman walks up to the display. It's a Saturday night. She's wearing a denim jacket. She puts her hands on her hips, cocks her head and considers the cars. She says to her friend: Well. They're not that ugly. These are the future taxicabs of Washington, D.C. Not these, specifically. Cars like these, though. The city council of the District of Columbia has made a decision: All of the taxis in the District - all 7,000 of them - must have a standard color scheme. Black Pearl cabs will no longer be charcoal. Checker Cabs will no longer be checkered. The District identity would usurp the individual company's identity. The plans are in motion: On Wednesday, a panel of the D.C. Taxicab Commission is set to make a color palette recommendation to the commissioner. These prototypes at the auto show represent possibilities, meant to prompt wide discussion. One of the cars is mostly green and yellow, with a hint of gray. One is mostly gray and yellow, with a hint of green. One is red, gray and black; the last is red, yellow and white. All of them involve a horizontal stripe, a whoosh, a sporty sense of forward motion. These cars have prompted wide discussion. The city has widely discussed how much it hates them. At the auto show, John Miller of Silver Spring stops by the taxi display, with his teenage son and his son's friend. In front of the four cars, there is a ballot box, where voters can select their favorites. "Go ahead," he encourages his entourage. "You're the ones who are going to have to live with them," he says. Long after he's gone. Taxis are our ambassadors On Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011, D.C. Council member Mary M. Cheh (D-Ward 3) put forth a piece of legislation. It was titled the Taxicab Commission Service Improvement Amendment Act. It was 32 pages long. It dealt with matters such as wheelchair accessibility and the reduction of carbon emissions through the use of hybrid vehicles. It discussed mandatory Global Positioning System devices and credit card readers with printable receipts. It also discussed taxi color. Specifically: "The Mayor shall . . . issue rules requiring all taxicabs operating in the District of Columbia to be of a uniform color."