MTA Bus Time, the authority’s live bus tracking service, expanded to cover all Manhattan bus routes Monday.
Credit: MTA
Forget about waiting for the bus in the blistering cold this winter — the MTA has Manhattanites covered.
MTA Bus Time, the authority’s live bus tracking service, expanded to cover all Manhattan bus routes Monday.
Riders can track the location of every Manhattan bus in real time on their smartphones, the Internet or through text messages.
The expansion adds almost 1,800 bus stops to the system, at a total of 6,000 stops with routes in the Bronx and Staten Island.
GPS hardware was installed in 2,852 buses in those three boroughs, but the MTA hopes to expand the service citywide in the next six months.
The expansion fits with the MTA’s plans to bring the system into the 21st century, said Darryl Irick, New York City Transit’s senior vice president for buses and president of the MTA Bus Company.
“Taking the guesswork out of riding a bus through real-time arrival information is a logical step toward that goal,” Irick said in a statement.
Thirty-four routes were added Monday, expanding the service to about 93 percent of all Manhattan bus customers.
To use MTA Bus Time:
- Go to bustime.mta.info and enter a bus route.
- Text an intersection, street address or bus stop code to 511123 from a cellphone to get a message listing local bus routes.
- Using a smartphone QR code reader, scan the QR code printed on the Guide-A-Ride schedules posted at bus stops.
Applications already equipped with MTA Bus Time data:
- iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch: All Aboard NYC, All Schedules Free, Bing Mobile, Bus New York City, Google Maps for Mobile, In Time Staten Island, Ride On Time NYC; Roadify, Transit Times
- Android: Bus Tracker Pro – MTA NY, Sched NYC
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