Uber says it is no longer willing to wait for the city of Portland to revamp its strict taxi regulations to allow residents to hail and pay for rides with the push of a smartphone button.

As of 5 p.m. Friday, Portlanders will be able to use the cutting-edge-yet-controversial rideshare service in what has been the largest West Coast city without Uber, the company told The Oregonian.

The company is rolling out UberX — a service that allows passengers to use an app to get a ride from drivers who use their own cars as low-cost de facto taxis. Uber cars usually arrive in less than 10 minutes and offer fares that are 35 percent lower than those of traditional taxis.

The clandestine move – city code prohibits unpermitted ride-sharing – was met with a threat of immediate retaliation from Portland Commissioner Steve Novick.

If Uber drivers are going to start operating without the city's approval, "then we will try to catch them and seek penalty," said Novick, who oversees the Portland Bureau of Transportation.

"They think they can just come in here and flagrantly violate the law?" he asked rhetorically. "This is really amazing. Apparently, they believe they're gods."

Under a city code prohibiting unlicensed taxis, Uber drivers could face arrest and jail time.

However, Frank Dufay, the city's private-for-hire-transportation manager, said it's more likely that rideshare drivers caught illegally picking up passengers will face stiff fines.

For the first offense, the city could levy a $1,500 penalty against Uber and hit the driver with up to $2,250 in fines. "It's not cheap," Dufay said.

Dufay said he would meet with Novick on Friday afternoon to discuss strategy for the city's code enforcement officers. "We can get out there and see if we can get an Uber ride," he said.

Novick learned of Uber's plans from The Oregonian.

Within minutes, Mayor Charlie Hales had David Plouffe, one of President Barack Obama's most high-profile campaign operatives and now an Uber vice president in charge of strategy, on a speaker phone, Novick said. "I told him that if they're just going to come in and flagrantly violate the law, we'll throw the book at them."

Brooke Steger, Uber Northwest general manager, said the city's threats shouldn't dissuade its hundreds of local drivers from trying to make a living. "We are 100 percent behind the drivers and we support them every step of the way," Steger said. "We hope the city doesn't take that kind of action."

Uber reiterated that the company isn't a traditional taxi company and shouldn't be subjected to what it considers "antiquated regulations" that stifle competition and innovation.

Uber's ask-for-forgiveness-not-permission approach shouldn't come as a surprise to City Hall. In fact, it has become standard operating procedure for the San Francisco-based startup, which is sitting on a $1.5-billion mountain of cash and operating in more than 100 cities around the globe.

The company has started operating in many U.S. cities without first getting regulatory approval – or even warning transportation officials that they're about to start picking up riders.

The tactic worked in Seattle, where the wild popularity of rideshare services such as Uber and Lyft prompted the city to adopt new regulations to allow the businesses. However, the strategy backfired in Nevada, where a judge kicked the company out of the state – at least for now.

Portland's taxi regulations are among the nation's most restrictive, say Uber and rideshare competitors such as Lyft. Among other things, city code requires a 60-minute advance reservation for non-taxi ride services and sets a strict quota on how many taxi licenses can be handed out during any given year.

So far, the heavily influential Private for-Hire Transportation Board of Review, which includes representatives from the Portland's taxi and town-car companies, have been dead set against relinquishing any of the city's 460 taxi permits to Uber drivers.

A recent Portland Bureau of Transportation report showed the city is greatly underserved by taxis when they're needed most, Uber officials said it's getting harder for the city to defend strict ordinances designed to protect the taxi industry from competition.

Although Novick supports a comprehensive review of the city's taxi codes, He says the new ride-sharing upstarts have an unfair advantage over the city's regulated taxi industry.

"The taxicab industry is a regulated industry," Novick said. "The existing companies are expected to abide by the regulations -- regulations governing safety, accessibility, insurance."

Uber, meanwhile, wants to compete with them while ignoring the rules they have to follow, he said. "We told them we were interested in their ideas about how to change the rules," Novick said. "Instead of taking us up on that, they are electing to break the rules."

Steger said the company still wants to work with the city to upgrade its regulations to allow rideshare companies.

At the same time, she said the current situation, with Uber operating in Gresham, Hillsboro, Beaverton, Vancouver and Tigard but not in Portland, is farcical.

Uber drivers can pick up passengers outside of Portland and drop them off in the city limits — they just can't pick them up in Portland.

"There's a definite need," Steger said. "Thousands of people have been taking Uber into Portland from the suburbs. It's frustrating when they're unable to get a ride back. It's actually a risk to public safety during the holiday and DUI season."

-- Joseph Rose