
Rover - All Your SF Transit Options In One Place - davidd8
http://blog.roversf.com
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guywithabike
One problem: It thinks that it doesn't take any time to walk from, say, Powell
station to a street-level bus, so it gives you connections that you can't
possibly make. This is the same problem that almost all transit apps have,
unfortunately.

Edit: Also, it seems to give me really bizarre suggestions. Right now, for a
trip to Alamo Square Park from downtown SF, it suggests that I take Bart from
Montgomery to Powell (that's one stop) and then somehow catch Muni bus #5 in 2
minutes. A much better option would be to just take Muni bus #21 which comes
past the Montgomery station in 5 minutes and heads straight to Alamo Square
Park.

The quest for a good transit app continues, sadly.

Edit 2: More bizarre suggestions: From Montgomery to Alamo Square Park, it
suggests this: <http://imgur.com/bYLpJJI> instead of taking bus #5 in 2 / 11/
or 19 minutes, which goes directly from Montgomery to Alamo Square. Also, it
thinks that it takes 0 minutes to get off of Bart at 16th and Mission and make
it to bus #22...

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lubujackson
I don't see why this should be so hard. They could use Google Maps to do the
walking path and then just apply a default walking speed (or even let you set
yours) to calculate walking time.

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potatolicious
Google Maps doesn't do depth or man-made obstructions to walking. The bus he's
trying to catch is _directly on top_ of the underground station, leading a
simplistic walk estimator to give a near-instantaneous result. In actuality
there are multiple stairs as well as a bottleneck-prone exit gate.

~~~
khuey
Transit apps need to implement the concept of "Minimum Connection Time" that
airlines use to determine legal connections at airports.

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kalvin
I've been using Rover on iPhone for a few months and it's great. Prior to
Rover the best option was using both Google Maps (great routing, but no real-
time schedules for SF transit) and Routesy/Nextmuni (real-time schedules, but
no routing)-- two apps for every bus trip. Muni buses are more often late than
not, so Rover is solving a real problem with just the walking+transit piece.

It also has InstantCab/Uber/Sidecar integration now so you can compare $ and
time across options.

Combine that with driving+parking, bicycling, and personal calendar data, and
it'd be the killer one-click transit app I've always wanted. Can't wait to see
you all build this out!

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watterssn
Nice I like the uber / sidecar / instantcab integrations.

For those who haven't Uber'd yet, get $10 off with promo uberfeb10.

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ajju
And $5 off InstantCab with promo "rover"!

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johns
This is awesome. One nit: if I pick a route, then the bus leaves there's no
easy way to 'refresh' the route and get a new timer without backing all the
way out and starting over or going to more routes and doing the time math.

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derelk
I've been using this for the past month or so, and overall I think it's the
best app for Muni. The interface is not anywhere near as slick as the Google
Maps app for example, but for transit routing it feels much more functional.

~~~
davidd8
Glad you like it, we're always working on improving the UI.

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bravura
SUMMARY: Rover considered harmful. Its transit routes are always delayed for
me.

I've been using Rover side-by-side with Routesy Pro and NextBus and Google
Maps.

Rover has a great interface, and maps from current location to destination.
Awesome. The only problem is that it always tell me that a bus won't arrive
for quite a while, roughly 10 minutes later than reality. (Do you want us to
sell you an Uber or other taxi option while you wait? Mildly suspicious.)

By contrast NextBus and Routesy Pro have terrible clunky interfaces, but at
least their next bus estimates are accurate.

Current workflow: Use Google Maps to find the route and the bus number. Use
NextBus to determine when that bus will actually arrive.

I would love Rover if the bus estimates were accurate, but sadly they always
overestimate the amount of time I'll have to wait. No thank you.

I have removed this app, it has deceived me too often.

~~~
davidd8
Hi Bravura, thanks for the feedback! Sorry about the inaccurate NextMuni times
- we had an issue earlier that would sometimes make arrival predictions fail
to update, but it should be fixed now. If you have a chance to give it another
shot, we'd really appreciate it!

~~~
bravura
I'll give it another shot.

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dylangs1030
This is a cool idea, I like it. Especially as I use public transportation a
lot.

1\. Add a more dynamic ETA calculator including 3 dimensions instead of just
2. What I mean by this is, I want to be able to roughly calculate how long I
can go up 15 stories if my commute requires that. (This is stretching the
boundaries of realism for a commute, but you see my point. It shouldn't say
I'm there if the actual destination is somewhere above or below me.)

2\. I know that these kinds of projects have their hands full with one
location, but can you port it to NYC and other metropolitan areas? You have a
great market in San Francisco but there are also plenty of options you could
incorporate in your app for places like New York. I live in NYC so I would be
inclined in this direction.

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arockwell
This looks really well done. I've used a bunch of different transit apps in
SF, and all of them are extremely awkward and hard to use.

I'm very hopeful I can use this app to replace nextmuni.com, which has always
been slow and buggy for me.

~~~
davidd8
Thanks for giving Rover a shot! Let me know if you have any feedback.

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bnycum
Too bad I just saw the app, I leave SF in the morning. Been using a mix of
Google Maps/Routesy/Transit. I do like the ticking timers of when the next bus
is coming. It's been an awkward experience constantly refreshing the apps if I
can manually. I do like the Google Maps because it shows markers for bus
stops, I heard they have an SDK to use. Also I like that Google Maps will show
you the stops on your route as well, helps to remember how many and what stops
there are without constantly watching your blue do approach your destination.
Just things I noticed as a "tourist".

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Garthex
It looks like they don't support BART yet. You should probably change the
title so it's not false advertising for those of us who are eager for more
apps that truly support all sf transit options.

~~~
davidd8
Hey Garthex! Thanks for checking out our app - Rover does support BART (with
real-time arrival data), try routing to SFO for example. Let me know if that
doesn't work for you - we'll investigate if something is not looking right!

~~~
jaredsohn
I've generally had success (and love the app due to the user experience and
integrated nextbus functionality) but I was getting a message "Rover only
works for SF MUNI right now." a few times for a particular route between
Berkeley and SF. So at the very least, that text should get changed.

Also, the headline seems wrong since it doesn't seem to support some transit
options such as AC Transit. Although, likely the spirit of the headline is
that it supports "all" kinds of transit options such as buses, Uber, and bike
sharing, but I'm sure that is also incorrect (i.e. does it include ferries?
cable cars? private planes? hot air balloons?)

Edit: Actually AC Transit is East Bay and the headline says SF options (rather
than SF Bay Area options), so the headline isn't wrong because of that.

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Garthex
Ah yes this is what happened to me.

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sqs
It would be nice if the linked page showed screenshots of the app.

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timdorr
The front page has a working demo. I think that's _way_ better than a
screenshot, personally :)

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pronoiac
Oh! The demo only appears above a certain width of the browser window. It's
Chrome and Safari only right now.

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erik_p
I can't wait to give this a try... I've been weekend hacking on trying to
improve on the NextMuni predictions, because they're just so consistently
misleading/awful.

~~~
davidd8
You can try an in-browser demo at roversf.com - let us know what you think!
Would also love to hear about your NextMuni prediction hacking!

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slykat
How did you get the arrival time & price data from Lyft / Sidecar /
Instantcab? Do they have a public API?

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wasd
<http://roversf.com/> is down.

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davidd8
Should be back up!

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starseedlure
Cute robot. Useful app. +1.

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pidge
So, are you hiring?

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ajju
I am sure the Rover guys won't mind much if I jump in and say that we
[InstantCab] are!

Send me an email or link to your github or resume or whatever at
aj@instantcab.com.

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drewwwwww
what personal data of mine are you going to sell to support the continued
development of the app?

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ignorantremarks
What makes you think they're mining your personal data? They could possibly
have funding already, and are aiming for acquisition? Like Instagram?

