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Touch-screen monitors that allow taxi passengers to pay by credit card will be installed in cabs here under a plan approved Thursday by the city's Taxi and Limousine Commission.

The monitors, already in 200 cabs as an experiment, also employ a global positioning system to map out where the cab is going and find information about restaurants and bars.

Taxi officials say the devices will help passengers make the most of the 13 minutes they spend on an average ride in the city.

Commissioner Matthew Daus said they could also help drivers, by giving them information about traffic, while boosting ridership by eliminating the need for cash.

"This project is nothing short of revolutionary and evolutionary for the taxi industry," Daus wrote in a recent agency newsletter.

But some cab drivers have decried the cost — up to $7,400 for equipment and fees over three years — and say the technology will let taxi owners and officials check up on them.

"I cannot afford the computer. What is going to happen to me?" driver Oscar Luzzi said at Thursday's commission meeting.

Bill Lindauer of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, a drivers' advocacy group with more than 7,000 members, said the group was exploring legal and political avenues to block the plan.

The taxi commission set an Aug. 1 deadline to choose a system. Starting Oct. 1, as taxis come up for inspection, they will be required to have the technology.

The issue has a delicate history. A 2003 experiment with touch-screen television in taxis ended within months amid passenger antipathy. The credit-card option is expected to prove popular with customers, though, in what is now a mostly cash, $1.8-billion-a-year business.

Cesar Norena, a 17-year taxi driver who got the system for free by agreeing to test it for the city, says passengers have used its features, and he believes the credit-card option will boost business.

"People really like it," he said, "and as a driver, I really like it too."

The global positioning system for the monitor, from Englewood, N.J.-based TaxiTech, automates required record-keeping. It could also help customers find lost items, such as wallets, by sending alerts to drivers.

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