Metro Transit’s online Trip Planner is more popular than ever.
The online tool helped customers plan a record 657,458 trips last month, beating the previous record of 656,017 planned trips set in September 2011.
Available at metrotransit.org and metrotransit.org/mobile, Trip Planner allows users to find individualized route and schedule information by entering start and end points as well as the time they want to travel. The service also displays an estimated travel time and calculates the amount of carbon emissions saved by taking transit.
Transit Information Manager John Howley said September is always a popular month as students return to class. But use of the service has grown steadily since it was launched in 2000.
“The trend has been upward pretty much ever since it hit the ground running,” he said. “It’s been our fastest growing source of information all the way along and has been just wildly popular.”
Year-to-date there have been around 5.3 million trips planned using Trip Planner. Howley said he expects to see the Trip Planner used more than 7 million times this year, beating last year’s total of 6.5 million.
Customers can get additional transit information by using the Personal Bus Schedule feature and through NexTrip, accessed about 150,000 times daily. Representatives at the Transit Information Center and third-party apps built based on publicly-shared Metro Transit data are also available
Frequent transit users can store trip plans, access Go-To Card balances and compile other personalized information by creating an account at My Metro Transit.
Metro Transit's online growth is not constrained to route planning, either. The metrotransit.org website saw 901,839 visits in September – a new record. Year to date, there have been more than 7.5 million visits to the website. Metro Transit’s Facebook page also surpassed 20,000 fans last month.
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