07/20/2006   English German
  Edition # 62  
San Francisco, 07-20-2006

Nextbus.com
Figure [1]: Runs according to a fantasy schedule: The J Muni train

Michael In San Francisco, the streetcars are known to run according to a fantasy schedule. The train doesn't arrive at a specific time; instead, the schedule literally states "approximately every X minutes," with X varying between 10 to 30 depending on the time of day.

It is, of course, annoying to walk down three flights of stairs to the stop and then wait there for 29 minutes because the tram just left right in front of you.

As is often the case, Americans use advanced technology here to make the chaos manageable. The streetcars have recently been equipped with a transponder, and along the route, there are receivers that record whenever a street car passes by.

The live measured data is sent to the Website nextbus.com which calculates in how many minutes the next train is expected to arrive at a defined stop. This can then be queried for free and in real-time over the internet.

Figure [2]: The website nextbus.com shows when the next Muni train will arrive at our stop.

The system works perfectly. If I want to take the J streetcar to downtown, I simply check on my computer shortly beforehand, which is running 24 hours a day anyway. If the web browser then shows that the next car will arrive at the intersection of 24th and Church "In 2 Minutes," a frenzy breaks out, I dash down the stairs and rush onto the street. However, if it shows "In 15 Minutes," I fool around for another 10 minutes before starting a leisurely descent. One of my colleagues even has a cell phone with which he retrieves the data!

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