A three-hour strike by ACT taxi drivers during peak hour this morning will do nothing to stop the arrival of ride-sharing service Uber in Canberra, the ACT Government has said.

From 8:00am, just under 100 Canberra cabbies drove off the job, with the convoy leaving from Fyshwick and making its way to the ACT Legislative Assembly.

The drivers said they were concerned that new services like Uber would have an unfair advantage over traditional taxis.

But ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr warned he had already made up his mind to allow Uber into the Canberra market.

"Without giving away all of the detail of the Government's reform package, you can certainly expect that there will be a regulatory environment for Uber," he said.

"But importantly there will be a lot of deregulation of the taxi industry in order to create a more level playing field."

The Chief Minister said the industry needed to change.

'We will not be arresting Uber drivers'

"The bottom line in all of this is that the Government will not be able to arrest our way out of Uber's entry into the market," Mr Barr said.

"We will not be arresting Uber drivers or people who use the Uber service. So our preference is to have a regulated environment."

Mr Barr said the trick would be to deregulate the taxi industry, helping traditional cabs better compete with the new technology and services.

This morning would normally be one of the busiest days of the year for Canberra's taxis, with Floriade in its first week and both the Federal and ACT Governments in sitting.

Mark Bramston from Canberra Cabs said his dispatchers had done the best they could to service demand.

"There's not a lot that we can do given the number of cars that are available," he said.

"But dispatching services in our call centre [were] focussing on the city area and Floriade and [we've done] everything we can with the cars that are there."

The taxi drivers' union apologised in advance for any chaos caused.

During the strike some cabs were still servicing the Canberra Airport.