Don't like iOS6's (lack of) transit directions? You need this.

https://github.com/simonmaddox/GoogleTransit-iOS6

by simonmaddox • 14 years ago

136 88 14 years ago

github.com

psychotik• 14 years ago

Or, use the bing app. I am not a fan of their ux but it sure works well!

Simucal2• 14 years ago

How do the Bing map's transit directions compare to the old iOS maps app?

rb2k_• 14 years ago

I searched for "logan airport, boston" and didn't receive any results :-/

scottschulthess2• 14 years ago

Is this in the app store or what?

Void_3• 14 years ago

No, it's open-source.

In order to run it on your iPhone, you'll have to pay Apple $100 per year. Or find somebody who is already in Apple Developer program, ask him to add your iPhone ID.

stcredzero• 14 years ago

Someone should start a "iDevBuddy" site, where people can pay a dev for use of her/his unused provisioning slots and install their own software.

scottschulthess2• 14 years ago

Open source apps can be in the app store, like openmbta

pudquick• 14 years ago

No. You need the $99USD/year iOS developer program from Apple to be able to compile it and install it on an actual iOS device (without it being jail broken).

bas• 14 years ago

I can only speak for my setup (I have Embark NYC installed), but the new Maps app delegates transit routing to Embark NYC. Presumably this works for other cities?

dailyrorschach2• 14 years ago

So far for me yes. Interestingly enough since I live in DC - I never had transit directions in Google Maps anyway.

dailyrorschach2• 14 years ago

Or maybe it was just me or I gave up trying, they appear to be there now at least on the website, no transit layer to view, but directions do appear.

Void_3• 14 years ago

Thank you for releasing this as open-source.

antirez• 14 years ago

Major cities here in Italy are all very well covered with transit directions, pretty surprising it's not like that for US cities.

techtalsky• 14 years ago

It's not so much that. If I'm at home in Brooklyn and want to get to a place in Manhattan, there might be two ways to go. Google maps calculates what the fastest way is, including walk time and train connections, and gives me a route that shows the stops, walking directions, and connections.

DanHulton• 14 years ago

I'm probably just going to pin http://maps.google.com to my front page and be done with it, unless of course Google releases a full-blown app (oh please oh please).

wes-exp• 14 years ago

I'm doing this and I also added the bing app which, although it's a bit clunky, seemingly has transit directions.

barista2• 14 years ago

I was hoping that link to lead to a product page for Lumia 920.

djbender• 14 years ago

Has everyone forgotten http://maps.google.com? From what I can tell you can get transit direction from their website and even place a shortcut to your Home Screen.

smspence• 14 years ago

But then what would all the blogs complain about?

jedberg• 14 years ago

It's not as good as the native maps app. In fact, I was just using it today. It's still slow and buggy (doesn't respond to all the taps).

swang• 14 years ago

If you use Google's transit maps at all you'd know how it's pretty much a step below the original native Maps app. The only thing going for the mobile web version is bike routes otherwise it's still a below par experience compared to Maps.

tomjen32• 14 years ago

Can anybody explain why Google can't simply make a version of google maps that is installable through Safari (they way Steve wanted apps to be delivered?) You need absolutely no permission from Apple, and their app already works on the web (just used it to get directions, in fact).

egypturnash• 14 years ago

Possibly they might not have been interested in fixing their competitor's mistakes for them.

tomjen32• 14 years ago

Bing is a competitor to Google.

IOS is a complement, which Google is trying to make a commodity through Android (and Chrome, its involvment is Google Fiber as well as its monetary donations to Firefox).

Google has no issue with IOS having access to excellent apps. They just don't want them to get a monopoly position.

siglesias• 14 years ago

They have that.

rayhano• 14 years ago

If you're in London, check out http://Citymapper.com (their iPhone app saves me everyday with live bus timings and the best route with multiple transport options).

antoinevg• 14 years ago

Thank you so much for this kind sir!

m_st• 14 years ago

Wow, this is a true hacker at work. Getting things done rather than yelling around. Thank you so much for this.

Cbeck527• 14 years ago

Agreed. This is a refreshing submission after all of these rant-y blog posts we've been seeing lately.

pcl• 14 years ago

Sweet! Any plans to put this on the app store? I'd love to recommend an easy fix for my parents that doesn't involve my dev certs.

Oh, and I'll happily pay for the app... Somewhere between $0 and $5 seems about right.

tmalloy3• 14 years ago

Co-Founder of Embark here (letsembark.com). We have apps for 12 systems, mostly in the US (BART, Caltrain, NYC, LIRR, MNR, NJT, DC Metro, Philly, CTA, Metra, Boston & London Tube). We also integrate with iOS 6 maps, so our apps should show up for you if they're relevant. In my subjective opinion, it's a way better experience than a google maps web view.

EDIT: Looks like my co-founder David beat me to the punch

slykat• 14 years ago

I love Google Transit directions. Can you give some examples of where Embark beats out Google Transit (screenshots if possible)?

Also do you have real-time updates on arrival times with SF Muni? Google Transit does not.

tmalloy3• 14 years ago

Here's one example we saw recently in new york going from the 116th/Columbia stop to 12 St Marks Place. Google's result: http://i.imgur.com/8zpbY.png Our result: http://i.imgur.com/gpDu5.png & http://i.imgur.com/8hvrs.png

Currently we don't have an app for muni, though it's something we're working towards. There are some nice apps for Muni that have real-time arrivals but lack routing. Transporter & Routsey are probably the two best.

bmeckel2• 14 years ago

Having had the beta for so long I hadn't actually expected integration with maps, I figured it'd just tell you that there were other apps available. I'll definitely be moving to embark for the time being!

davidwhodge5• 14 years ago

Hey guys. David Hodge here from Embark. I just wanted to let you know that we've got you covered for transit directions in many large cities. (And more being added all the time)

Look for Embark in NYC, Washington DC, Boston, London, Chicago, San Francisco. Embark will work underground and has results tailored to each city instead of the very general results you tend to get from Google Transit.

zbowling• 14 years ago

Hi David, I love your apps. Long time iBart user, but what would be nice is a single app that will cover making connections across transit systems. If I'm going to the South Bay tell me how to take Muni to BART or CalTrain and then BART /Caltrain to VA and how far to walk. THAT would be the killer feature that would making having no transit directions awesome.

davidwhodge5• 14 years ago

Hi zbowling, great to hear you like our apps! Thank you for the suggestion. We'll keep that in mind for the future.

gergles• 14 years ago

The m.511.org site is serviceable if not beautiful and does what you're asking.

osi2• 14 years ago

embark for chicago only seems to include the 'L', not the CTA bus routes?

judp• 14 years ago

It seems it's the same for Boston. Embark only has the T, no buses. Which is a shame, because the app looks great otherwise. It even shows hubway (bike rental) stations around the T stops.

davidwhodge5• 14 years ago

David from Embark here. Yes, this is true. No busses presently. Stay tuned. We're working on it.

JofArnold2• 14 years ago

This is possibly the comment that you never want to hear when you have a nice-looking app, but I do find them a bit painful to use. Use of screen height and extra button presses are too key areas that give me grief. It could simply be something as subtle as the London Underground map defaults to too far zoomed-in. Maybe try changing that?

However, they are free, free from ads and work really well. I especially like the way they tell you the direction of the train you're going to get.

davidwhodge5• 14 years ago

Hey Jof,

Thanks for the feedback. Generally people have been very happy with our apps, but we pay close attention if people have problems. We have a number of changes in store for London based on our user feedback. I'd really like to discuss these details with you sometime if you get a chance.

David

RandallBrown• 14 years ago

Are you going to be adding Seattle any time soon?

thecosas• 14 years ago

Any chance San Diego is on your radar? :o)

driverdan• 14 years ago

How about just sticking with iOS 5 until Apple fixes this? Is it really that important to upgrade to 6? (obviously doesn't apply to the new phone)

The latest doesn't always mean the greatest.

w1ntermute2• 14 years ago

That's little consolation to people who've bought the iPhone 5.

mtgx• 14 years ago

I've never understood why people like to pre-order something before even one review on it is released, or before they get a chance to see it for themselves.

mtodd• 14 years ago

Apple won't be fixing this. Their approach is to recommend transit apps depending on your location instead.

MartinCron• 14 years ago

Which doesn't have to be a terrible idea. Explicitly encouraging transit app competition is great.

Now if only you could change the default handler for addresses to route to other mapping/direction programs. Once we get that, this teapot tempest will die out.

vegashacker2• 14 years ago

Somewhat off-topic, but does anyone in SF who rides public transportation agree that Google's Map directions in terms of time predictions don't work? Like they're almost always completely wrong. I wonder if they use scheduled bus times instead of actual ones.

Anyway, I was hoping to be able to plug in something like Routesy to iOS 6 maps, and then I'd be a happy camper.

jarek3• 14 years ago

Unless specifically indicated as live times, Google uses the scheduled times. I've seen live times in Google Maps in only one area, Portland, OR.

Scheduled times are coming from GTFS feeds that agencies register with Google. As far as I know, Google didn't create a unified live transit predictions/tracking API, which seems to me a rather surprising oversight.

kelnos3• 14 years ago

It might be speed. I've written an app for SF using the NextBus API, and it is slow. In the time it would take to return the live times for a particular route at a particular stop, Google has already given me four possible routes (and has helpfully gotten me a glass of water, as well).

davidwhodge5• 14 years ago

We've found that Google has historically had a very hard time in San Francisco, and many other big cities for that matter. The results often seem reasonable at first, but end up being impractical in practice. We've found that getting good routing results in cities like SF requires a lot of attention to detail in each particular city. Google has very smart people, but they can't focus everywhere at once.

Disclaimer, I work at Embark and we make transit apps. (letsembark.com)

Edit: it also doesn't help that Muni often doesn't run on schedule.

malyk2• 14 years ago

It shouldn't matter if they don't run on schedule because every bus/train has a GPS on it from which you can make predictions. iCommuteSF and Routesy (and i'm sure others) use this to give me results that are accurate the vast majority of the time.

Spooky23• 14 years ago

Most transit companies don't have a real time feed. The key piece of information is how often the bus runs anyway!

avelis• 14 years ago

I also have noticed this in SF. It becomes most frustrating when I want to travel to a location using routes I am unfamiliar with or don't ride often. This means I can't off the top of my head guess when the next bus would be coming before choosing that bus route. In that case I usually pick a live route app like Transporter to see how long of a wait till that bus comes. Unfortunately, that time spent in another application can prove costly if you are in a hurry.

vegashacker2• 14 years ago

Totally agree. I use Google Maps for "route ideas" if I don't already know. And then switch to Routesy ASAP for the live arrivals.

tullidil• 14 years ago

I'm pretty sure Google Maps and a plethora of other applications on the App Store simply use the MUNI schedules (http://www.sfmta.com/cms/mroutes/schedules.htm) for the purposes of "time prediction." Since buses in SF are basically never time due to many reasons (traffic, accidents, once I was on a bus where the trainee who was driving took the wrong exit on the way to Daly City BART and the actual Muni driver on the bus had to take over the wheel) the predictions are never accurate.

The only app that has done me right is Transporter, and I'm pretty sure it scrapes Nextbus or some other service for time predictions.

kelnos3• 14 years ago

No need to scrape, even. NextBus has a public API.

drstewart• 14 years ago

NextMuni (Muni's app) is the best for SF imo.

m0skit0• 14 years ago

Just don't use it.

jsanz• 14 years ago

Guys, I'm from HopStop. Our app has got you covered for your public transit needs. We support lots of cities in the USA, Canada and some in Europe. We also have some nice features other than transit directions, such as schedules and transit maps. Check us out!

Note: Maps integration coming soon for our iPhone app. Our iPad app is already working fine with Maps.

gedaxiang• 14 years ago

Make a paid version so I can get rid of the ads!

drewda• 14 years ago

Another option coming soon: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/228865951/transit-app-fo...

joeshaw• 14 years ago

I just learned about Lumatic today (http://lumatic.com/) and it seems like a worthy replacement for transit directions in many places.

Here in Boston it seems to think that I am not near any transit, but it does happily use the transit near my house to route me on different trips. I like the landmark-based turn-by-turn navigation -- I hope that's something that becomes more useful as time goes on.

Don't like iOS6's (lack of) transit directions? You need this.

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