Hey, Boston! There’s a fresh new set of real-time, GPS-enabled MBTA iPhone apps for you thanks to Cambridge-based Nextransit. The company’s version 1.0 release of their Nextime and Nexmap apps just recently hit the app store. Featuring a beautiful design, push notifications, and easy navigation and visual cues, if you’re a bus user in particular, these new apps leave little need for you to rely on others.
Nextime
For bus users, the Nextime app concisely delivers all the information you could ask for about the what, where and when of buses and bus stops. One of the apps most differentiating features are push notifications, alerting you when you should leave to catch the bus – even customizing it tailoring how long it will take you based on your walking speed.
Open this app to automatically identify what buses are nearby, how long until they arrive, and whether you can take your time walking there or have to run to catch it. Information is presented in a smooth interface, with bus route number in the middle column as well as an icon indicating how quickly you should move to catch it: green means walking, yellow means get your move on, and a gray hour glass means you have time to spare. Clicking through to each bus line will open a map to the bus stop, aiding you if you’re not quite certain where the stop is.
Want to benefit from this app’s push notifications? Simply click “Track” next to the bus route, which will prompt you to select which upcoming bus you want to catch (e.g., 12 minutes out, 40 minutes out), when you want to be notified before you’ll have to leave to catch it (e.g., 2 minutes before, 5 minutes before), and what walking pace you want to have while heading to the stop (e.g., at a leisurely pace, at a running pace). An alert with a nice bus horn will pop up based on your selections letting you know its time to leave.
Have a go-to route or buses your frequent? Mark them as favorites for even quicker access to real-time transit tracking.
Nextransit’s Nextime app currently works in the following cities and systems in addition to Boston:
- MUNI (San Francisco) — San Francisco Municipal Railway
- AC Transit (East Bay) — Alameda-Contra Costa Transit
- WMATA (Washington D.C.) — Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority
- STL (Laval, Québec) — Société de transport de Laval
Nexmap
If you want an interactive transit map on hand, Nexmap app is the holy grail. Commuter rail. Bus lines. Light rail. Subway. All these routes are typically displayed separately in a variety of maps, or are combined in overwhelming fashion with inclusion of things like street intersections. Not on Nexmap where all are displayed on one, interactive map.
Clicking on any particular stop or area on the map will display the buses, subway and commuter rail lines that make stops there — each complete with station name, inbound/outbound indications, and time until the next trains/buses are expected to arrive. While Nexmap doesn’t currently support tracking with push notifications for subways, you can use the same push notification tracking in Nextime within the Nexmap app.
Another great feature of this app is MBTA system alerts, which you can see by simply flipping the top right corner of the map. Check out the screen shots below:
