Mayor Adrian Fenty Thursday scheduled the demise of the zone taxi fare system, ordering all cabs to have meters installed by April 1, 2008, and setting fares that start at $4 and creep up by 25 cents for each one-sixth of a mile.

The publication of proposed rules and regulations tied to a new meter system comes one day after thousands of cab drivers walked off the job to protest the end of zones, and only two weeks after Fenty announced the switch.