TechFlash - Latest Comments in How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Jubilate76 — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 16:33:43 -0000

I like your post. You can get all the smartest people in seattle together to come up with a snow plan, but in a city that doesnt have snow but once every two years, it is hard to distinguish what will work on paper and in practice. So, we don't get it right the first time. Lets work together to try to get it better for the next time. Instead of fighting eachother.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Jubilate76 — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 16:31:06 -0000

How does the app fail when the busses turn the system off? Is it the apps fault? Is it the city's fault? Why does there need to be blame in this. It isnt a new thing that the Metro turns off the systems during snow routes and holiday routes. The problem isnt with Metro, phones, or apps. It's with the apathetic Seattlites that want everything without paying for it.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Jubilate76 — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 16:28:03 -0000

Really, the current system failed people? I can't believe that. People are acting as this is the first time it's happened. When Metro goes on Snow routes (which I think includes holiday routes) they turn off the service because the system doesnt properly calculate transit times with the 5 bus is on the 37 bus route. The logarithm doesnt know how to compute that. So, yes, GPS will fix this, but Seattle doesnt pass taxes and doesnt want fares to go up, yet wants everything handed to them on a silver platter. Come on guys, those not taking busses sat in the same snarl you did. I think angry people are just trying to blame someone besides themselves. Take ownership and instead of complaining take action in a productive, non-complaining way. Provide solutions not gripes. I'm so tired of the whiney people in this town!!!

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Mark Lee — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 15:05:58 -0000

"How a mobile phone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm", perhaps? Or is that too generic?

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

kingblind — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 14:10:36 -0000

Uh, it failed for android devices as well.. This wasn't just an iPhone related issue.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Nick Hall — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 20:30:50 -0000

The underlying problem here is communication. King County Metro did not provide timely updates through their website, third party application providers or old school services such as a closure hotline or asking another bus driver. Sure there were authoritative tweets about the issue, but not everyone is on Twitter (or has a data plan - yeah even in Seattle).

Regardless of which app you may be using (including Google Map's public transit routing) none of the apps had accurate information as to what the status of given (snow) routes were. Announcements of route closures (such as no service to Fremont and Wallingford) were not set apart or easily accessed by non-Twitter users.

In fact, the 'Alerts' functionality found on the King County Metro site was actually a link to a PDF of the snow routes - and provided no real-time information for travelers. After watching a lot of the back and forth today, it's clear to me that the crowd-sourcing of information via SMS, Twitter, Facebook and email turned what was a nightmarishly-freezing public transit disaster into a manageable crisis.

Having years of experience in the custom web application industry, I'm interested to know how we could create a crowd-sourced, city-wide emergency broadcast system. Syndicate tweets, facebook posts, emails, sms messages and RSS/XML feeds from websites. Many of my coworkers who left at 5p and made it home in a timely fashion credited following a few folks on Twitter along with having IMs or phone calls with people sitting at computers (who can more readily and decisively search for content at a desktop than someone with a mobile device).

As a result of yesterday and today's weather, several companies have allowed employees to work from home or have had 'snow days' and closed offices. Apart from personal time lost, what has been the projected productivity time lost (cost) due to weather and poor planning/accommodations/communication on the part of King County?

**Full disclosure: I should mention I personally use OneBusAway when travelling from Downtown Seattle to Ballard, it's quite handy and accurate enough where I have no complaints about the application. And my commute last night (in total) 3 hours waiting for or on bus routes, 2 hours pushing cars and traffic out of major intersections and 1 hour walking from end of bus route home. Lastly, some of my co-workers were stuck on buses to the east side for over 7 hours, some not getting home until 1am or later (not including walk from bus stop to home).

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Jibreel K Riley — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 17:26:49 -0000

I don't know about y'all but me thinks: bad weather + seattle's capabilities of handling snow = (bleep) it, I'll stay home

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

johnhcook — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 14:45:53 -0000

It is also available on Windows Phone 7, so I guess the headline could have been:

"How an iPhone, Android and Windows Phone 7 app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm."

Seems a little clunky to me. Headlines are certainly an art, and it takes real skill to try to nail down effective ones.

I appreciate the feedback.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Guest — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 14:38:06 -0000

Yes, Mr. Eyman did cut auto licensing fees, but I don't understand how GPS tracking would have helped yesterday. Would you have felt any better if you had pinpoint precision of buses -- with snow chains -- slipping helplessly down underpaved streets? Even if Seattle had the money, the idiots who run this town believe that it never snows here. Every year there is a snowstorm and every year the city stops. Even if we had a trillion dollars in public funding we would have to do without buses on days like yesterday and today.

Light rail, on the other hand, works. SoundTransit responded by curtailing its growth.

Real leadership is needed. Real public transit is needed. Unfortunately, we the people will have moved to a more functional city by the time it comes on-line.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Seacube3 — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 14:27:42 -0000

Hmm, what's the old adage. When you point a finger at someone, remember that the other four are pointing at yourself.

Our buses have antiquated tracking systems because it's more "economical." Shortly after I moved to Washington state, there was a "Public Initiative" that cut auto licensing fee's. The sponsor, Mr T. Iman, was hailed as a hero for cutting wasteful taxes. Almost immediately public transit had to be cut in every corner of this state. Most people shrugged and said, "I don't use those services regularly anyway."
So here we are years later with a minor emergency and people are frustrated because the, "service they don't use regularly," does not have modern GPS tracking.
Once again clever programers and leading edge technology are hamstrung by the shortsighted actions of "we the people." D' oh!

Regarding our "public servant's" at every level, they can only work with what we provide because they are working for us with what "we" provide. (And that "we" includes our mega-corporations who continue to do everything they can to pay as little tax and demand as much profit as they can.) Even in the face of three decades of failing economic policy new political hucksters get elected on the promise of walk across some body of water and deliver the impossible for no cost. So far the only "walking on water" I've seen involved a ferry… or cruise ship.

Maybe what we need is an "app" that informs the ignorant of the ramifications of their actions. I would call it "ActualNews.app" or something like that. B. Franklin would be proud.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Seacube3 — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 14:27:18 -0000

That didn't post right. I will try it as a new post then.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Scott Koon — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 14:23:55 -0000

I agree that the story was even handed and presented the facts, but the title of this post is pure link bait IMO. Especially given that OneBusAway is available on both the iPhone and Android platforms.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Seacube3 — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 14:23:54 -0000

Hmm, what's the old adage. When you point a finger at someone remember that the other four are pointing at yourself. Our buses have antiqued tracking systems because it's more "economical." Shortly after I moved to this area there was a "Public Initiative" that cut auto licensing fee's. The sponsor, Mr T. Iman was hailed as a hero for cutting wasteful taxes. Almost immediately public transit had to be cut in every corner of this state. So here we are years later and constrained budgets, clever programers and leading edge technology can't covering every contingency. Thin We did this to ourselves, we are doing this to ourselves.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Luis Antezana — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 14:08:31 -0000

I'm a daily Metro rider in constant hope the service improves and becomes a viable form of transporatation for more and more people. That said, it's pure hypocrisy of our mayor and city council to espouse the use of Metro services when they don't use Metro themselves. There's some common wisdom about using the things the people in charge use, not what they tell the people to use. The day the mayor goes to work on the bus every day is the day most people can believe they should take it, too.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

mckoss — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 14:08:06 -0000

OneBusAway is likely the most widely installed app on Android and iPhone phones in Seattle .

Since KCMetro is so behind the ball, I think OBA should start using the data from their own users to crowd source the GPS data they need. Each time a OBA user boards a bus, it could transmit the accurate time of departure and track the buses location during the entire rider's trip. There wouldn't even have to be any more complex UI in the app as you could detect the different speeds of the user as indication that they actually boarded.

I talked to Brian about this last summer at an Android mobile meet up. I wish he had more resources to work toward this.

BTW, I was lucky enough to exit the bus without having to wait for the above pictured jack-knifed bus to clear. My fellow passengers on the #255 probably had to wait many more hours waiting for help to arrive to clear 520.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Luis Antezana — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 14:04:09 -0000

This is a great idea. It's reminiscent of the app featuring crowd-sourced line wait times at Disneyland.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

johnhcook — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 12:29:54 -0000

OneBusAway didn't work because of the cut of the data feed from King County Metro and antiquated location technology on buses.

I thought that was pretty clear in the story, and the links to Ferris' blog posts which provided a lot of insight on the issue.

I agree that Ferris was open and informative about what went wrong. The story was not meant as a damnation of his service or him, but as an explanation as to what went wrong and why OneBusAway didn't work yesterday.

Here's more from Ferris' blog post:

"I know of a lot of you are probably frustrated that OneBusAway is pretty much useless (no real-time, no snow reroute info) on a day when you need it most. I'm pretty frustrated too, if only because I have been working with King County Metro and other agencies over the past couple of months to try to get adverse weather reroute information into OneBusAway."

Thanks for the comment.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Guest — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 10:51:32 -0000

Or better yet, couldn't we just recall this loser? I hear Dino Rossi has a car and needs a job.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Guest — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 10:43:09 -0000

Metro screwed up. Our Mayor, who like his predecessor has delusions of competence, told us citizens to park our cars and take mass transit. Then Metro pulled real-time data without any alternative. Most of my fellow men experienced commutes more than 4 times their normal length. Roads were impassible.

Please remember this day when you vote in the next election. Hire a Mayor who understands that roads and transit are actually important.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

Brian Davis — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 10:40:41 -0000

So how again did OneBusAway let anybody down? Sounds to me like KC Metro screwed up, and you're pointing fingers at the wrong guy. Hell, Ferris sounds like a pretty stand-up dude for taking all this criticism OF HIS FREE AND VOLUNTARY SERVICE and giving calm, careful explanations of the real reasons why things went south.

Please at least reclaim a little of your integrity and change the title of this piece.

Re: How an iPhone app failed bus riders during Seattle snowstorm

software — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 03:55:26 -0000

obviously, we just need to get all those smart-phone folks on a bus to input their route number into a GPS-enabled app that feeds to a db and out to all the other folks