GPS Trackers on University of Michigan Buses Plugged Into Google Maps

Students at the U of Michigan can see where their bus is before they trudge out to the bus stop. Their buses have been outfitted with GPS trackers that report their position via a wireless signal. The coordinates are then passed to a database server which make the data available to the web application.

This is the kind of thing I’d been hoping would happen sooner rather than later. As a bus commuter and someone who regularly cuts it close, something like this on the Minneapolis transit system would frequently save me a 10-20 minute wait in the morning (after a barely-missed bus). Plus, watching the little buses blip around the map is fun.

[tags]GPS, public transit, google maps[/tags]