The Bloomberg administration has spent millions of dollars installing custom-designed GPS tracking units in fire and sanitation trucks over the past several years, but the system is rife with malfunctions, according to audits by city Comptroller John Liu. The GPS system has repeatedly shown fire trucks and sanitation trucks to be in the middle of New York Harbor or sinking in Long Island Sound, when in fact they were still safely on land. The city has spent as much as $56,000 for a single unit in a sanitation truck, and will continue to spend money on what Liu calls "wasted on technology that falls short of what’s promised, raising questions about the oversight of expensive outside consultants." more ›

On Staten Island, serial domestic abusers are going to have start wearing GPS tracking units that will text their victims when they get too close. "To many domestic abusers, an order of protection is just a piece of paper," Staten Island District Attorney Daniel Donovan said yesterday, announcing the plan. "It does not deter these relentless scofflaws from constantly terrorizing and attacking their victims. I refuse to stand by and continue to watch this happen time and again without trying to do something about it." more ›

Ladies and gentlemen, it's open season on no-good cheating lowlifes, at least over the river in Jersey, where a man caught cheating on his wife because of a GPS tracker she stashed in the car has lost a lawsuit against the private investigator who caught him. The cheater in question was Gloucester County sheriff Kenneth Villanova, whose wife at the time began to suspect him of infidelity in 2007. more ›

Yesterday, a Jersey man trusted his GPS over his gut...and drove straight into a house. Driving early yesterday morning in foggy conditions with his wife and children in the car, Harini Gunasekera couldn't clearly see where New Road meets Ridge Road in South Brunswick, so he kept going straight like his GPS told him to. Doesn't he know it's always a bad idea to listen to the machines? more ›

Having trouble getting to the forbidden donut shop? Homer Simpson can help—the animated family man is now on the TomTom App for iPhone, and can act as your co-pilot. The PR folks tell us this is the first time a celebrity voice has ever been available for mobile phone based GPS. They added: more ›

An ambulette driver, who used his ambulance as a getaway car, was convicted yesterday of holding up a Queens nail salon and threatening to kill a customer if she called for help. And he only has himself (and GPS) to blame! more ›

We're drawing ever-closer to the Philip K. Dickian dystopia paradise in which all advertising is personalized according to the purchasing power of each individual consumer. (That means YOU, Kevin Spacey fan and likely Casino Jack ticket-buyer!) In a report on the booming taxi ad biz, the Times notes that people riding cabs through the East Village can now expect to see backseat TV ads for Blue Man Group, which performs on Lafayette Street. The theater troupe is just one of the advertisers "using the GPS devices in cabs to pinpoint when and where its commercials should play." They know where you are, and they're coming for you. more ›

Does your job have the right to track your whereabouts with GPS without your knowledge? Even if they're tracking you to try and prove that you are lying to them? That's the question at the core of a new lawsuit brought forth by the NYCLU on behalf of former Department of Labor employee Michael Cunningham who was fired from his $115,000 per year job as director of the staff and organization development based on information gained from a GPS tracker that had been placed on his family BMW. more ›

Have you been having trouble getting a taxi from Manhattan to Brooklyn recently? The Post has, and if the Post has a problem, them everyone must be having a problem. They set their crack team of hack scientists to canvass lower Manhattan, and found that nearly half the cabbies refused to take them over the bridge, which is currently undergoing infuriatingly extensive renovations. We're not that surprised, but hell, we have trouble getting cabbies to take us to the right destinations in Brooklyn anytime; once, we hailed a cab in Williamsburg to take us to the south end of Brooklyn Heights, and were dropped off in Prospect Heights. more ›

New TLC chairman David Yassky has a lot on his plate, but one thing he says he's committing to is making sure yellow cabs have an equal presence all around the city—not just Manhattan. The former City Councilman told CityRoom, "Having represented for eight years a district in Brooklyn, I know many residents in the city, particularly outside the core business district of Manhattan and nearby neighborhoods, feel yellow cab service is concentrated there. In fact, it is.” A recent study shined light on taxi trips, showing that Penn Station is the most popular place to catch a cab, Wednesday has the highest taxi traffic, and the biggest pickup spot on the weekends is the Meatpacking District. So for those of you who complained the map only showed Manhattan, you're right! more ›

Last week, the NY Times took taxi GPS data and offered up many fun facts about Manhattan congestion—for instance, Wednesday seems to be the most congested day of the week (on average). Today, the Times offers a cool interactive map showing where taxis were hailed, based on taxi GPS from last year: "The most popular corners to catch a yellow cab in Manhattan can now be pinpointed, at any hour of any day of the week, thanks to a record of 90 million actual taxi trips that have been silently tracked by the city." more ›

Besides trying to figure out whether taxi drivers cheated passengers out of fares (or just made a mistake), know what else taxi cabs' GPS systems are good for? Giving urban planning geeks a glimpse into Manhattan's traffic flow. The NY Times has details on a study where "officials tracked the routes of tens of millions of taxi trips over the past two years. The result: a database of speeds and travel routes that can be broken down by minute, month and neighborhood." more ›

Even though the city installed vehicle locators on 1,300 ambulances and fire trucks three years ago, consultants who worked on the GPS system are still getting paid more than $3.5 million per year. Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez blasts the city for paying Hewlett Packard consultants up to $410,217 annually to tweak a system that's already in place, as it threatens to close fire houses and layoff firefighters due to possible state budget cuts. He argues the money would be better on FDNY operations, considering it only costs $1.5 million annually to fund a fire company of 29 firefighters and four officers. An FDNY spokesman said the consultants still provide needed upgrades and enhancements to a system that has "reduced response times across the city." more ›

Baby Jesus is coming strapped this Christmas—with GPS! Many churches and synagogues in the area are equipping their nativity scenes and menorah displays with the locating system to impede hooligans who often use the holiday season to get their jollies via vandalism, costing the places of worship up to thousands of dollars for the sometimes pricey decorations. New York-based firm BrickHouse Secruity offered free, short term loans of GPS to religious institutions that now will be notified immediately by email if their display is moved. Reverend Bob Gorman of St. Ambrose Church in Old Bridge, New Jersey told The Star-Leger, "We call it God's Positioning System." Their church is currently planning to to drill a hole in Baby Jesus' backside to slip in the GPS device before the figure is placed in the manger on Christmas Eve. Somewhere King Herod wonders in defeat, "Why didn't I think of that?" more ›

On Monday, a man driving in Bedford Hills made a right turn, just like his GPS told him. Or did it--because he drove onto Metro-North train tracks and into the path of a train. Luckily Jose Silva and his passengers got out before he was hit, but this is the second time a driver has blamed GPS for making them drive onto the tracks. more ›

A violist with the NJ Symphony Orchestra was very lucky when the Taxi and Limousine Commission was able to find the $40,000 viola she left in a cab. Ann Roggen didn't take a receipt, but the TLC used GPS to figure out which cab had driven her from Fairway back to her Upper West Side apartment on Thursday. The TLC contacted driver Deniz Getting, but the night-shift driver was sleeping when the TLC sent messages on Friday. Fortunately, when he did get the messages, the viola was still the backseat! The Post reports that TLC Commissioner Matthew Daus himself returned the viola to Roggen, and Getting drove her to her concert in Newark. As for Roggen, who cherishes her instrument's the "unique sound," she promises to "always make sure to take a receipt." more ›

The New York Times recently dispatched no fewer than five reporters to the streets of the city in order to uncover the latest piece of breaking news: cab drivers can be rude and will attempt to take financial advantage of you if given the opportunity. The investigation uncovered a citywide fleet of yellow taxis in which just over half are compliant in installing credit card readers, and many that did have them falsely told passengers that using a credit card would result in additional charges.

Many cabbies, it seems, will use the card swipers only sullenly, and only after a resistance that can be as ingenious as it is misleading. Excuses range from, “There is a minimum cab fare for credit card use” to “The device doesn’t have to be activated until the new year” to “It’s too short a ride.” (Not true, not true, and not true, say city officials.)