New York City taxi officials say that a new GPS system and other technology upgrades opposed by cab drivers will be installed and used as planned in coming months, despite a threatened strike by some cabbies.

Citing concerns based primarily on fears that the GPS technology invades their privacy, cabbies have said they may go on strike in September and plan to set a strike date in mid-August. They also oppose paying installation costs for credit card payment systems and 5% credit card transaction fees.

However, a city taxi spokesman said yesterday that the technology is already installed in about 1,000 of 13,000 cabs and that all of the owners of cab licenses have picked one of four contractors to do the installations between Oct. 1 and Jan. 31.

"Today, the vast majority of the industry remains excited about the systems, which are currently in almost 1,000 of the city's cabs, with more quickly joining them every day," Allan Fromberg, a spokesman for the city's Taxi & Limousine Commission (TLC), wrote in an e-mail to Computerworld.

Fromberg noted that GPS technology is "only the smallest component" of the new systems, which also support credit card payments, the use of interactive electronic maps for passengers, two-way messaging, music and other forms of entertainment, and electronic trip sheets that relieve drivers of the need to use pen and paper. The upgrades were approved in 2004 when a 26% fare increase was imposed, Fromberg said.

But the executive director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, Bhairavi Desai, said the city "bullied" the license owners into meeting an Aug. 1 deadline for picking contractors to install the systems. If they did not meet the deadline, they faced a fine, she said.

The fact that a license owner picked a contractor "doesn't mean they agree with the systems at all," Desai said. In fact, she said she believes that many of the cabbies will not go along with the installations and that a strike is as likely as ever.

Desai would not comment on when a strike might occur, and Fromberg would not comment on the city's possible response to a strike.

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