onebusaway: improving the usability of public transit brian ferris university of washington design...

OneBusAway:Improving the Usability of Public Transit

Brian FerrisUniversity of Washington

Design Use Build – University of Washington

University of Washington

Why am I “here”?

To tell you about my work on OneBusAway

To provide an iPhone developer perspective


Motivations

The goal of OneBusAway is to help provide a better experience for transit riders, and to encourage more people to use public transit.

Focus on: Real-time arrival information Innovative technical solutions Usability Free as in speech and beer


We’ve Got You Covered


Usage Statistics

On a weekly basis: 40k unique users Web: 15,000 iPhone and Android: 25,000 Phone: 2,000 SMS: 800

More traffic than transit agency’s own tools


iPhone App Access over 24 hrs


Awards

Washington Technology Industry Association - 2010 Industry Achievement Awards Best Use of Technology in the Government, Non-Profit,

or Educational Sector Seattle 2.0 Startup Awards

Best Non-profit Startup – Nominated Seattle Magazine – Best of Seattle 2009

Best Local iPhone App Seattle Weekly – Best of the Web 2010

Best Local iPhone App - Nominated


How is OneBusAway changing user perceptions and behavior with respect to public transit?

We surveyed 488 OneBusAway user to find out.

Impacts of OneBusAway


Change in Satisfaction

“I no longer sit with pitted stomach wondering where is the bus. It's less stressful simply knowing it's nine minutes away, or whatever the case.”


Change in Usage

“While my work usage was pretty much on a fixed schedule, OneBusAway has made impromptu trips much more convenient.”


Personal Safety

18% of respondents reported feeling somewhat safer and 3% reported feeling much safer.

Safety was correlated with gender

“Having the ability to know when my bus will arrive helps me decide whether or not to stay at a bus stop that I may feel a little sketchy about or move on to a different one. Or even, stay inside of a building until the bus does arrive.”


Open Transit Data!

What makes this possible?


Open Transit Data

OneBusAway inspired by trips to Portland “Why can’t we have that here in Seattle?”

Transit agencies publish their transit data (GTFS) Developer ecosystems in the Portland, Bay

Area, Chicago, NYC, Boston, beyond

Different names: #opengov, #gov20, #opendata

One result: innovative apps that help the public


Government as a platform

“Why should I rely on 3rd-party developers to provide essential tools to my riders?”

Developing or procuring tools like these yourself can be expensive, time-consuming, and outside the tech comfort zone of many agencies.

The public can do it cheaper, faster, and better

Why reinvent (and re-pay for) the wheel?


Case Study: NYC MTA

MTA has made multiple attempts to deliver real-time bus info

34th Street Pilot: $140M estimate to extend citywide

Looking for cheaper solution


OneBusAway + OpenPlans + MTA OneBusAway, in

partnership with OpenPlans and MTA

Open-source vehicle tracking solution

Using open standards: GTFS + SIRI

SIRI API

SIRI API

aasdf

Real-time Module


An iPhone Development Perspective

The OneBusAway iPhone App


The OneBusAway iPhone App


iPhone, iPad, iOS, iWhatever… A quick note:

I’ll use iPhone, iPad, iOS pretty much interchangeably, but…

Devices: iPhone iPod Touch iPad

Operating system that powers them all: iOS


Why iPhone app development? Love it or hate it, it’s the biggest game

in town Verizon iPhone announcement tomorrow

will only fuel the fire

Users could care less about our opinions of various platforms. They just want the app. Either you provide it Or someone else will


Pay To Play

To really develop an iPhone app, you’ll need: A Mac to run Xcode on An iOS device to test your app on

simulator only goes so far A developer license ($100/yr) so you can:

Run your app on your phone Submit your app to the app store

Adds up to real cash


Writing an iOS App

You develop using: Objective C – The native iOS Programming

Language Xcode – Apple’s Integrated Developer

Environment


Objective C

“Let’s strap some object oriented features onto C, as inspired by Smalltalk”

C-like, but object oriented features don’t look anything like C++

Not my favorite language, but it works… Experience with C and object oriented

language concepts will help, but only so much


What does it look like?

Simple function declaration - (return type) fnName:(arg_type)arg_name

Message passing: [name length] Objective-C: Send message “length” to

object “name” Java: Call method “length” on object

“name”

- (NSString*) getHello:(NSString*)name { NSLog(@"Length=%d", [name length]); return [NSString stringWithFormat:@"Hey, %@!", name];}


The Good and the Bad

The Good Message system allows flexible object and

type composition But don’t shoot yourself in the foot ; )

The Bad No garbage collection for Objective-C on

iOS


Xcode

Works well enough

I’m a raging Eclipse addict, so that colors any reasonable advice I could give here ; )


The App Store Review Process It’s gotten better, but… Still largely a nerve-wracking process

My first app was rejected once You play by Apple’s rules or you don’t

play at all Review process can take up to two

weeks Critical that you find bugs BEFORE

submitting


* I’ve never had a full-time job for longer than 3 months in my life, so take it with a grain of salt ; )

My Advice* To You


Learn by Doing

The best way to learn a language, a framework, a tool: Build something with it!

Find a quick project and try to make it happen: First version will probably be junk, but don’t

sweat it

Look for the things that annoy you on a day-to-day basis for ideas and inspiration


Questions?

Thanks!

onebusaway: improving the usability of public transit brian ferris university of washington design...

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