Tech tools for Metro riders fall flat

Two mobile tools for savvy transit riders — a bus tracker called OneBusAway.org and Metro's "rider alert" message service — failed to deliver during the worst of Monday's commute. And those problems could persist Tuesday.

The technology hit its limitations at the very time people needed it most — when slick roads turned icier and numerous traffic accidents left much of the region in gridlock Monday night.

And Tuesday morning, road conditions are expected to be just as bad — maybe worse. Metro buses will again operate on snow routes.

One of Metro's tools is "rider alerts," which deliver text or e-mail alerts to about 13,500 riders who have signed up for special messages. Sunday night, Metro sent out an alert that all buses would be on snow routes Monday.

But Monday morning, during the commute itself, Metro didn't have the manpower to alert riders about delays on specific routes. So no "rider alert" was sent to people trying to take a bus across Aurora Avenue North, for example, when a collision closed down five of the six lanes and backed up traffic throughout Fremont.

Metro spokeswoman Linda Thielke said the staff that normally sends out those alerts had to be pulled aside to handle other snow-related issues. Other agencies also send out alerts about traffic, however, including the Seattle and state departments of transportation.

Another tech tool used by bus riders, OneBusAway.org, did not show real-time arrival information starting late Sunday night because Metro stopped sending out data when it switched buses to snow routes. OneBusAway uses Metro's data to help passengers monitor bus-arrival times through text messages, mobile Web browsers and smartphone applications.

The Metro data used by OneBusAway comes from transponders that send a signal whenever a bus passes, Thielke said. When the buses are on snow routes and don't pass by the same transponders on regular routes, the system begins producing incorrect information. For that reason, Metro stopped sending the data feed.

By default, OneBusAway showed the scheduled arrival time throughout Monday, not the real-time information, because it was not available, said OneBusAway creator Brian Ferris.

"While the real-time arrival predictions can be spotty for vehicles on major adverse-weather reroutes, tracking still works for routes that have minor reroutes or no reroutes at all," said Ferris, a graduate student in computer science and engineering at the University of Washington.

Next year, buses will be equipped with GPS devices, which will eliminate the problems with transponders. But Thielke said GPS systems have their limits, too; for example, they can't predict when traffic will start moving again after an accident.

"GPS would not tell you if that blockage is going to clear," she said.

About 12 buses got stuck during the Monday morning commute, and it was not known Monday night how many buses were stuck. Anyone who tried to use Metro to get home likely experienced severe delays caused by crowded, slow-moving buses and accidents on the roads.

Sound Transit only rerouted two of its buses for the morning commute, although by afternoon 15 Sound Transit buses operated by Metro had been rerouted.

For riders, the experience ranged from miserable to surprisingly good.

Times sports writer Danny O'Neil was stuck on a bus for about five hours Monday night trying to get home to West Seattle from Renton.

"I estimate we've moved three blocks in the past 45 minutes," he said at 6:45 p.m. "Periodically people get off and decide to walk. There is a Jack in the Box coming up on the right. The bus driver is planning to stop out front so people can use the restroom."

In Northwest Seattle, Steve Moody said he waited for a bus for 30 minutes, then sat on the bus for 20 minutes while it inched along 46th Avenue Northeast near Fremont on Monday morning. A 9 a.m. crash had closed five of Aurora Avenue North's six lanes, backing up traffic as far north as Green Lake.

Eventually, because the bus had made so little progress, Moody got off and walked home.

But Chas Redmond, a regular commuter and board member of Feet First, a pro-pedestrian group, said he had no trouble taking the bus from White Center to First Hill, then back home again, around midday.

He praised Metro for making an early decision to put all buses on snow routes and chain them up. "Metro clearly wanted to get in front of this, and they did a good job," Redmond said.

Katherine Long: 206-464-2219 or klong@seattletimes.com