STM Mobile screenshot
via Patrick, a new iPhone application has been launched called STM mobile that scrapes the STM website for bus arrival times and keeps track of favourite stops for easy access. It costs $0.99 through the Apple AppStore.
For those without an OMGcool iPhone, there’s the free busmob.com service, which does the same but through a light-weight website instead of an application.
Or you could just call AUTOBUS from your phone, or check the posted schedule, but that won’t make you cool.
UPDATE (July 31): Pierre-Nick has a review that’s mostly positive, but points out that it doesn’t use geolocation to find the closest stop.
UPDATE (Aug. 2): CFD has an interview with the program’s creator.
UPDATE (Aug. 7): The Gazette’s Roberto Rocha has an article about STM Mobile and busmob.com and how the STM is planning its own mobile schedule service for the fall.
UPDATE (Oct. 24): There’s also this very basic service which does pretty much the same as busmob.
Just checked the busmob site @ one bus stop whose bus times recently changed… the site’s not up to date :/
I’m gonna make a little rant in here :)
Is the STM’s Tous Azimuts *ever* doing to be updated? Is there any place where I can send suggestions for improvements? It’d be great for that website to have a more ‘personalized’ feel, where I can have a list of favorite destinations, favorite bus stops, downloadable pdfs of itineraries (for the whole day/week), downloadable pdfs of the bus schedules as they are printed at the bus stops, more flexibility when choosing itineraries (make certain buses favorite, or ‘ban’ certain lines, etc). There’s so much that can be done on the user interface level… not sure how interested they are in these kinds of suggestions.
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Calling the number is not a serious option. Especially in the winter. It requires too many keystrokes to finally get the bus times.
You should be able to text the STM service to get a reply txt msg with upcoming bus times.
The iPhone STM mobile app lets you check the times before you’re out in the cold. Unfortunately it requires an internet connection to work. So those of us with iPod touches are still out in the cold because there aren’t many bus stops equipped with wi-fi.
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