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As you may or may not know, TransLink has been in the process of updating it’s main technology services for a few years now. For example, they upgraded the CMBC’s radio network to improve correspondense between drivers and central communications - at the same time this upgrade allowed for GPS or Auto-Vehicle Location technology. They are also currently upgrading the CCTV systems on SkyTrain, including digitizing their storage mechanism from good ol’ videotape to something a bit more 21st century. While I don’t have the scoop on all this “under-the-hood” improvements, I’ve got some new and interesting info. 

One of the more visible tech additions of late has been the installation of AVL (aka: GPS), APC, which is Automated Passenger Count, and the audible annunciators. All three are relatively cheap. The technology is part of the communications system and is thus installed. These other technologies that it enables, such as dynamic displays, are currently under installation.

Thanks to all TransLink staff that helped procure this information! 

Auto Vehicle Location or AVL

AVL is the central part of Coast Mountain Bus Company’s new TMAC communications radio system. Thanks to the technology in this new system, a whole host of functions are now possible:

•  real time fleet tracking for operations and customers
• Computer Aided Dispatch
• improved emergency response
• off-line performance analysis
• on board annunciators and dynamic displays

The real time dynamic displays are on about 600 vehicles right now, with installation to be completed across the fleet by fall. 

Automated Passenger Count or APC

APC is being installed on 15% of the bus fleet, which translates to about 200 vehicles. The deployment decision varies based on bus and service type. The installation is complete and was paid for under the Capital Budget. APC will continue to be installed on 15% of new expansion buses. APC was studied for implementation on SkyTrain, but there are no immediate plans for installation. 

Audible Annunciators

The annunciators that are currently being installed at the same time as the AVL dynamic displays occured to due to several reasons: TransLink’s Access Transit Strategy, improved customer service, following industry best practices, in addition to a Canadian court case that required stops to be audibly spoken for the blind (in this case, the annunciators allow the drivers to worry about one less thing).

The annunciators will be installed across the fleet by fall. 

SkyTrain CCTV

SkyTrain’s Closed Circuit Television system is being modernized as we speak. The storage system is being converted from videotape to digital and will be complete shortly. The cameras themselves will be upgraded in 2009/2010. 

GPS is a pretty cool system, especially having it available to the public instead of reserved for industry or governments. It has a ton of applications, with just a few examples off the top of my head:

• tracking a package in real time
• navigation during travels on the road, the ground, or the water
• tracking a bus in real time to help with connections
• geocoding photos

I’ve used an in-car GPS once in a rental car, which worked okay. But for Christmas, my Dad bought a famed TomTom, which I got to play around with today.

My main qualm with GPS has been it’s slow market penetration. The economies of scale have not exactly taken place, and it’s due to having a very fluid and expansive market with crappy products. When I say expansive market, I mean all the manufacturer’s products are so different and incorporate so many variables that it’s difficult for the consumer to easily choose between one or the other.

For example, some products require a subscription, some rely on expensive map upgrades, while others are just very expensive from the get go. Some are mobile, some are in car - some have expansion capabilities, some can play MP3s, some have Bluetooth, etc! It’s almost as bad as the cell phone industry, except less people need a GPS as much as they need a phone.

And yes, the products themselves are cool. But they sure aren’t easy to use for your regular Joe. Let alone being pretty. This is all about user experience and it’s something that Apple has been forcing the tech industry to raise the bar in every year since it’s inception. It’s about creating a product that’s not only easy to use, but fun too! Most GPS fail miserably on this mark.

The TomTom is apparently one of the best in this regard. And while I give it props compared to others I’ve seen, it still wasn’t that great. Yes, it had a nice menu system and UI overall, in a small portable touchscreen piece of hardware, but it’s maps really sucked. And the maps are the single most important thing in a GPS! (It also had some bad lag, making me think the engineers should improve system efficiency or throw in a faster processor).

So, to fix the UI problem, I figured the GPS market should follow the PC market - where multiple manufacturers create a bunch of hardware, while a few players create some nice software. If the biggest problem is maps, then why not get some main players in there who have some experience with maps: Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft. Then, people have a recognizable, easy to navigate mapping interface for both their portable GPS needs and online maps via the web.

Google has already worked on adapting their maps to an in-car GPS, so it wouldn’t be hard to expand from there. This would open up new sources of revenue for the big three, just like how Microsoft gets a cut for providing the OS for most PCs. It would also improve the interface and overall experience for GPS users, driving demand, and lowering prices.

It’s time to take the next step in GPS.

It was frustrating enough to see TransLink waste 1 million dollars on iMove, but it makes it ten times worse seeing them refuse to improve the site, especially after promising improvements down the line. I’ve known about iMove for nearly half a year now, with absolutely no major fixes to the site in that time.

I’ve checked into the site every once in a while, and from what I can tell, it’s never updated with any real time crashes or incidents (it’s main purpose). Looking at it right now, it shows a bunch of “incidents” from November or early December. The site also refuses to make the proper distinction between “construction” and an “incident” - most have a triangle, but one uses a cone…

I’m also interested in seeing if that real time traffic overlay actually works. And why do they have it for the Massey Tunnel and Highway 1 near the Second Narrows, but not for the Lion’s Gate (especially when that bridge has the technology in place, viewable on this site)?

That’s without mentioning the ugly interface, an area where absolutely no fixes have been seen. What’s going on with iMove?

This is part 2 in a series discussing how the digital revolution is currently reshaping society. Don’t know what’s going on? Go back: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4.

This is the post I’ve been building up to all series and the only one that actually relates to the title. I’ve spoken about the Internet as software, Computers as hardware, economies of scale and barriers to entry, the OLPC project, and more. Well, we’re finally going to delve into digital kids.

The Internet is already cheap enough for most to afford it and prices will continue to go down, even as speeds go up. There’s also some innovation going around in the field, from mesh Wi-Fi to WiMax, as the industry attempts to provide connection for the last mile (aka: people out in the boonies). And as I mentioned in Part 4, the OLPC has created a whole new market of hundred dollar computers, finally breaking any barriers to entry for hardware. It has also enabled computer access for millions of children in developing nations, and has the possibility to provide all children in the 6 to 12 market with their own personal computers, something new for the Western World. Up until now, personal computers are generally obtained in the teenage years.

But, obviously, there’s more to technology and the digital world then just computers.

And this is where it begins to get very interesting, beyond the question “what would happen if every child in the world had a personal computer?”

I was doing some research on children’s gifts earlier this month, and found two lists, both of which outlined a number of tech toys designed for the children’s market. Here’s some that caught my eye:

• Digital Cameras: Fisher Price, National Geographic, Polaroid, and VTech are all producing kid friendly digital cameras with simplified controls but surprisingly good quality, with up to 3 megapixels! Pricing is between $50 and $70 dollars, cheap enough to replace if the camera gets wrecked.
• Cell Phones: There’s two main options up here in Canada - Migo, by Telus (and Verizon down south) and Firefly, by Rogers (and Cingular down south). In the States, there’s also the Tictalk by Leapfrog, and Disney has been venturing in this space. Basically, it’s a very simplified phone with the ability to call a handful of programmable numbers, along with a 911 direct button. Some are even GPS capable!
• AI Robots: These have existed for a bit now, starting with that darned Furby and the Poo-Chi robot dog. The toys available today, such as the Pleo, are more advanced than the animatronics at Disneyland! It features “organic movements and adaptable behaviours”, making it seem way more lifelike than your grandpa’s robot. In fact, the Pleo is said to learn from it’s experiences…
• Virtual Worlds: *You* may know Second Life, but children today live and play in two extremely popular virtual worlds: Webkinz and Club Penguin. Webkinz has the child purchase a real life plush animal, which features a code enabling them to create a whole house for this pet online and participate in a larger world filled with games. Similarly, but without the plush component, Club Penguin, recently purchased by Disney, is your kids MMO. For a cheap fee, kids can have their own penguin and roam around this online world playing games and talking (with minor restrictions) to other players.
  
• Digital Video Cameras: Polaroid has released a video companion to it’s kids digital camera, the Pixie. It features 640×800 resolution, a 1.5″ pop-out screen, and expandable SD memory. All for $80!
• MP3 Players: SanDisk is the first to enter this market with a digital music player designed from the ground up for children: the Shaker! It has a built-in speaker, two headphones jacks, and is as small as a salt shaker. Just load an SD card with MP3s, and pop it into the player. Price? Only $30!

Aren’t you amazed at the cool tech gadgets that are being created for this emerging market? I mean, this technology is barely five years old and is not only available for so bloody cheap, but is also being designed specifically for children.

There is bound to be *huge* aftereffects of giving kids these technologies at such a young age, most of which I see as being good. The worst part is the gadgets might get lost or wrecked, but then they are so cheap anyways it’s not really a big deal.

These are pretty big things: digital cameras, virtual MMOs, intelligent robots, cell phones… All available from age six! I can only imagine the cool things I could’ve created if I had this type of technological access from such an early age.

Just envision giving a kid a digital camera at 7. This child can just go around taking thousands of pictures of everything around him. Over the years he can improve and perfect his photographic skills. I wonder how advanced he will be by 11… by 20…

What about the communication and web skills kids are learning at this young age by participating in these virtual worlds? No longer are they jumping in at 13 or 14, in the prime of their teens, wanting to rage against the machine. These are children just beginning to learn respect, manners, and reasonable limits. Does this mean that, now that they have prior experience with the Internet before the tumultuous teen years, the web will be a nicer place? Maybe, thanks to the resources on the web and having the skills to access them, these kids will know where to turn when something is getting them down…

The Millennials are kids that were born after 2000 into a digital world. Today, there are absolutely no barriers of entry to the digital market, even at age 5, no matter what your income bracket! Will our brains rewire into multitasking, super networking organic machines? The effects are boundless, and I for one am genuinely exciting at finding out how it all unravels.

This is part 2 in a series discussing how the digital revolution is currently reshaping society. Don’t know what’s going on? Go back: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.

Have you heard of the One Laptop Per Child project? If not, it’s probably because you don’t live in America, and the international media is doing a half-assed job of reporting about it (see: social media revolution) despite it’s huge effects it will have on the whole world.

The OLPC was a non-profit project launched by Nicholas Negroponte from the MIT Media Lab. It’s goal was to create a hundred dollar laptop and put it in the hands of children in developing nations. It was supposed to sign up multiple national governments to purchase hundreds of thousands of these laptops, which would allow it to achieve it’s goal price through the economies of scale.

After many meetings and prototypes, the laptop has now been shipped off to several countries and is now in the hands of these children, many of whom have never seen a computer before; who have absolutely no idea of how powerful the machine they are holding truly is.

You see, there were two simple arguments about the OLPC. The naysayers made a clear point of asking what need a child has for a laptop without sanitary conditions, clean water, food, and basic shelter. Those who supported the project, like me, made the case that that laptop has more potential for ingenuity than the combined international aid money that’s been sent around the world for the past decades.

Say a poor child living in the shanty towns of Argentina received a laptop at school. The shack he lives in with his family doesn’t have power, and their only light source is a few candles. With this laptop, and an internet connection, he can instantly find instructions on how to build a simple windmill. After a few weeks of the family saving money, and purchasing materials down in the city, he can create and install a windmill, which could then easily power a lightbulb.

Or, let’s take a less ingenius solution, and something just a bit more common. Let’s say there’s a young teen in sub-sahara Africa who just got this laptop. Her first Google search is “Africa”. She clicks through the links, with one of them talking about HIV. Although she lives in the most infected continent in the world, her teachers don’t speak of it, and her parents don’t understand it. She begins some simple research of the virus. Through this basic understanding of what HIV is, and how to protect yourself from infection, she has now dramatically reduced the likelihood of her catching the disease. She can now explain this information to her family, and although her school may not cover it, she can raise the conciousness of her fellow peers.

Almost thankfully, the OLPC XO isn’t your typical laptop. It’s minimal processor, and small screen are what enable it’s cheap price. Besides, the machine isn’t supposed to be a workstation. But regardless, the XO features some very cool design, specifically made for developing nations, where the machine truly shines:

• the small screen can be read clearly during the day, even in direct sunlight
• it has mesh networking built-in, allowing the OLPCs to allow connect to one another within a certain radius. This networking enables a simple internet connection to vastly expand it’s reach.
• battery life is excellent (I’ve heard of it lasting a good 24 hours)
• with simple power attachments, one can recharge with a hand crank, a pull string, or even a small solar panel
• it’s incredibly sturdy

The amazing thing about this device is that we are giving the children in these developing nations the tools they need to alleviate themselves from poverty. Large scale international aid and charity has never worked as good as we all hoped for 3 reasons:

1. Corrupt governments diverting the money
2. Approaching the problem from a top-down perspective, versus from the bottom-up
3. There’s no incentive for the people to use the money wisely

The microaid programs have been so successful because they eliminate numbers 2 and 3. However, those programs rely on people understanding or learning about investing and social entrepreneurship.

The strengths of the OLPC are similar. They give people something useful, a real tool, directly. And because the governments are paying directly for these laptops, you can be sure that the machines are going to schools.

As the old proverb goes, “Catch a man a fish, he’ll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish, he’ll eat for a lifetime.” Well, all a child has to do is some simple research online about fishing and he’s good to go.

Despite slightly missing it’s goal price, the OLPC has been an immediate success on another front. It has created a whole new type of machine, completely changing the marketplace.

Thanks to simple competition, Intel has developed it’s own mini-laptop, called the ClassmatePC, for developing nations. Asus, being a smart and nimble beast, took the developing nations out of the requirements, and built a cheap, small laptop for developed nations - the eeePC - which has proven to be a humongous success. There’s already rumours that several other manufacturers will enter this new market very soon.

Which begs the question, why don’t children in developed nations get access to these computers? Sure, they may not be building windmills with them, but giving children access at an even younger age would continue to revolutionize the Western world.

As I mentioned in Part 3, the age at which people in the First World at owning their own personal computers continues to drop. Right now, it’s a the point where a teenager typically has his of her own computer. Heck, even a number of schools are providing them with one.

But, let’s go even younger. Why not give the 6-12 market an OLPC type machine? If it breaks, it’s cheap enough to replace.

Doing so would dramatically increase our children’s digital literacy, at a much younger age. This in turn would spur technological innovations at a much younger age. You think a 20 something running a multi-million dollar web startup is crazy, wait till his child gets his own personal computer at age five!

The OLPC will not only bring developed nations out of the poverty cycle, which in turns helps balance out the world economy, but will also bring the next billion online into this whole new social global community. Take it one step further into the developed nations, and ingenuity will take another leap forward.

In the last article, I will discuss some more digital tools that are now available to children, and what effects this will have on society as a whole.

This is part 2 in a series discussing how the digital revolution is currently reshaping society. Don’t know what’s going on? Go back: Part 1, Part 2.

As I discussed in Part 2, the Internet is the software side of this digital revolution. As a commodity, it’s relatively cheap to come across, or even available for free in certain areas. This low barrier of entry for the Internet has always been hindered, to a degree, by the hardware side of things. Obviously, if you couldn’t afford a computer, you weren’t about to get online for a serious amount of time. There’s a whole other conversation to be had about internet access at libraries and such, but the strength of the computer is that it has always been *personal*.

Unfortunately, the economics of scale haven’t exactly worked out their magic just yet on computer hardware. That’s not to say that prices have not come down dramatically over the decades - because they most certainly have - but the entry level, up until recently, was still too high for a whole new segment to jump into the market of owning their own computers.

See, whereas the Internet only took into account monthly cost, and speed/bandwidth capabilities, the development of the computer has faced a few more hardships that don’t factor into the Internet’s calculations. Sure, computers decreased in cost, and increased in power and functionality, but along with this new potential, users created whole new applications for their robust PCs.

At one time, a person would only partake in making spreadsheets and word documents on their personal computer - the heavy lifting was taken care of by an enterprise machine (aka: workstation). As computers developed, the lines began to blur, and people began using the machine for graphic design, education, gaming, and, of course, internet access. Then there was the huge jump into the digital age where computers, as Apple put it, were now the certain of your digital hub: a place to store and interact with your movies, music, pictures, and more.

So you see, the advances in processing speeds and storage capacities have been met equally with increased usage of these new capabilities. The downside of this is that nobody wanted or would use an old computer: it just wasn’t capable of doing modern computer tasks on an older machine. This is why computers have remained quite steadily in the thousand-dollar market (yes, there’s cheaper ones nowadays. That’s what I’m coming to!)

A number of years ago, with the advent of Dell and Gateway, computers were made available for under a thousand dollars. However, and this still must be taken into account, computers from these companies are still considered low end simply because their business model is based around quantity and not quality. The upside of this however was the availability of a *personal* computer to whole new markets. In the past, a family would typically share a computer. With the advent of the sub-thousand dollar PC, you could now expect to see multiple PCs in a household, with one for each family member.

And we can’t underestimate the leveling factors this has on the digital divide between citizen’s of lower socio-economic statuses. Many middle class families, who couldn’t previously afford a machine, could now afford to buy one on Boxing Day or at Wal-Mart.

And this is the point we are at now. It is quite common for a household to have several computers, all for separate family members: a laptop for Dad, a PC for Mom and the little sister, and a laptop for the older brother. There’s two interesting points here though:

• The parents, unless one is in business or techno-literate, will typically share a family PC and not request their own personal computers, unlike the typical teenager who would want their own
• There is a undefined age at the moment for children’s access to computers: there’s the age at which they first start using the family PC, and there’s the age at which they get their own personal computer

You used to hear a few years ago of parents buying laptops for their graduate sons or daughters, as a college/university gift. Now, it’s not rare to see a high schooler with a laptop, either bought by the parents or paid for by the teenager him or herself. While they are rarely used in K-12 schools, unlike the ubiquitous laptop in universities, it is still a huge symbol of freedom - something akin to a teenager’s first car several decades ago.

If we are to follow the trend, one could assume you’ll begin to see under 12 year olds with their own computers. I used to scoff at the idea, thinking they wouldn’t have the responsibility or the operational knowledge to handle such a device, but I’ve been slowly changing my mind on this front. Kids from 2000+ were born into a digital world - this stuff is all around them, everywhere and everyday. There’s no point in underestimating their potential for success.

In the next article, I will discuss how the OLPC project has completely destroyed any barriers to entry for computer hardware. We will also see how this ubiquity of hardware and software will effect the current generation of kids: the Millennials.

This is part 2 in a series discussing how the digital revolution is currently reshaping society. Don’t know what’s going on? Go back: Part 1.

Leo Laporte did a keynote speech at Blogworld ‘07, where he discusses his comparisons between old media and new media, what it means to be an internet content producer, and the effects this whole shift will have on our favourite institutions. It’s tremendously interesting, although it will take a bit of time, clocking in at 45 minutes (he starts 15 minutes in).

Leo’s main discussion point is about how the Internet has leveled the playing field, in media, in education, in creativity, etc. It has enabled over a billion people, so far, to connect simultaneously with one another and make their voices heard.We have to be clear about the Internet however, because there’s two parts to every solution: the software and the hardware. The Internet, obviously, is the software part of this. Luckily, access to the Internet, like many things these days, was handled quite well by the economies of scale, bringing us both an increase in speed, along with a decrease in price, as more people started subscribing.

This increase in speed was incredibly important, allowing people to share more than just static HTML pages: images, audio, video, etc. Again, the scaling effect takes hold, enabling not only higher quality content to be both uploaded and downloaded, but also way more of it. I can remember watching the Star Wars: Episode 1 trailer, an exclusive for Quicktime back in the day. The trailer was tiny, and took forever to load on dial-up, but hey, it sure was cool. Before the internet, trailers were relegated to movie theatres and videos. Nowadays, you can get these trailers, and far longer video content, streaming or downloaded, in HD!

You can just as easily compare this to images. We started off with small, low resolution images, and slowly the web became graphic intensive. Now we are at the point where photographers, or just families, can share *all* their photos online, either for free or a very low cost. This would not have happened without the speeds we now have.

Plus, that’s without mentioning the shift from film to digital cameras, something that happening a lot quicker than one would’ve presumed. I can still remember all the pros saying they’ll never switch (now look at them), or going to London Drugs and the salesguy telling us that the 3 megapixel digital was good for small prints but that it could never beat film. The economies of scale again took hold, and here we are.

So sure, people have access to faster speeds and a more diverse Internet than ever before. This is important, but the game changer is what people choose to do with it. This is where we get into social media, or web 2.0 - where what you once thought about the news, information, and networking gets completely thrown out the window. And for good reason.

Old media is a very bland format. It’s the lone teacher preaching editorialized information to a full classroom - except on a much larger scale. This is nothing more than limiting access to information.

Yes, when the Internet first started, people could create their own sites for the world to see. But that didn’t mean the world was watching.

Google made it easy to find stuff on the web. That was a huge shift. But the social shift occurred with Wikipedia: where anyone in the world, even people with no knowledge of HTML, could instantly improve or update a citizen’s encyclopedia. It’s obviously been a proven success, and despite some worries from the laggards, it’s actually been found to be more accurate than most other sites or certified encyclopedias. Just goes to show that we’re smarter when we pool our information together than going it alone.

With Wikipedia, it’s all about the community. It’s the thousands of diehards, constantly skimming pages for updates and verifying information, that makes it all work. And then of course, it’s the millions of people out there, who might want to add their own information on a lesser known topic, or perhaps reword certain phrases to improve readibility, or maybe add their own images to an entry. It’s the community that makes it work. This is the social web.

Let’s take a slightly different example. There’s always been producers and consumers of information and content. As I mentioned earlier, this role of producer used to be extremely limited to the rich and famous. Not so with web 2.0, where all you need is access to the web and you are off. You can blog, you can podcast, you can videocast - *you* are the content producer now. And people are listening.

This low barrier to entry is enabling hundreds of thousands of people to get their voices, opinions, and information out there, which is utterly overhauling the way old media works.

Facebook, flickr, digg, Google’s apps, YouTube, forums, etc.

It’s transforming the web, and society, because it’s taking the internet to the next step. It’s creating connections and networks between all the people online. As most should know, change starts with a discussion. Having these conversations, openly available to a worldwide audience, with the possibility for them to join in on a two way dialogue - it’s an incredible way to level the playing field, whether that’s location, age, gender, income, etc.

And all you need is an internet connection.

I’m beginning a five part series today, which a new post each day this week. The latest articles will each eclipse the one it proceeded, and will shift from providing interesting information to enabling discussion. The topic: how the digital information revolution we are currently living in will dramatically reshape the world in the coming years - perhaps far faster and remarkable than anyone can imagine.

Just to start us all off, here’s an 8 minute slideshow, “Shift Happens”. This video was originally produced for a school board in America, thus explaining the minor focus on education towards the end, and ended up going viral late last year. They recently updated the video with the latest stats and it’s truly some very fascinating data giving us all a sense of the huge societal shifts that are beginning to occur in this world, thanks to the internet.

And let the hating begin :P

I hate being so negative, but I’m a fan of Apple, of Nintendo, of Google - these amazing organizations that almost continuously release amazing products. So when TransLink brings out something, I expect and envision something great. Unfortunately, as I’m beginning to learn, I shouldn’t have my hopes up too high.

I wrote a post about iMove a while back, when it was still in beta. I basically lambasted the whole product as a waste of TransLink’s, and potential users’, time and money. Since then, a few things have happened.

• TransLink surveyed the whole Online Advisory Panel, with 1144 respondents participating. I don’t think the response was what they were hoping for; I mean, just look how disappointing this first line of the email was: “In general, respondents told us we were headed in the right direction…” The Panel a liked few things: the concept of a one stop transportation shop, usage of Google Maps, and webcams. When those are the only three things people like about your product, I gotta say that sounds like quite a wreck.
• After the survey, TransLink fixed three things: they increased the size of the map, tried to speed up the Google Map, and added mouse-over descriptive text for the icons. No, they didn’t really fix very much.
• TransLink promised they would have these features in store by the winter: reducing redundancy of the tabs, moving the detailed info table from the bottom of the site to elsewhere, and creating a mobile version of the site. We’ve yet to see any of thee improvements.

And so, iMove was officially released. Not much has changed. This site has major, major problems right down to the core of the design of the site, and minimal tweaks are not going to fix it. TransLink should not have released iMove in it’s current state, and should’ve gone back to the drawing board. The design needs to completely eliminate redundancy, and focus on a balance between usability and information. iMove can’t be everything to everyone - and TransLink has realized this, promising not to add a trip planner into it, leaving that functionality for their official trip planner or Google Transit. In any case, to me, the major issue is the design. However, the development of a mobile site is also very essential, and something they are apparently working on.

What’s worse, iMove is now a live site. It should be providing the latest traffic information to it’s users. Then, why do I see notifications for things that happened in October or earlier? And I would bet that if anyone compared the notifications on iMove and the traffic radio reports, you would see nothing was updated on the site, making it completely useless. I’ve been following it throughout the day, and have not seen one new traffic alert. For a live site, this is unacceptable.

But, you want the icing on the cake? According to News1130, iMove has been in development for *five* years. Five years. For this piece of crap. Oh, but it gets better. The Backgrounder, provided to me by TransLink, said that the various levels of government have contributed a total of $1,080,900 to this project. TransLink paid $490,000 of the initial investment, and has also committed $210,000 for “content development, marketing and project management.”

Woah. Something is absolutely wrong here. Obviously, the government does not have any clue on how they should be interacting with the web and how much they should be paying for it. This is absolutely ridiculous and I’m completely appalled.

iMove is shit. Maybe Vancouver’s web geeks can fix it at TransitCamp.

I thought the age of stealing Apple’s acronyms has over. Boy was I wrong. I wouldn’t be surprised if the terrible name was created by the same web firm that designed this ugly website. iMOVE is Translink’s attempt to bring together regional transportation information into one place for easy access.

Unfortunately, I don’t think it succeeds very well at all:

• The site is, as I said before, fuuuuuugly. This thing looks like it was designed in 1997 - yes folks, that is a decade ago now. I am pleasantly surprised they used Google Maps with the site (yay!), but it’s implementation is far short of even Google’s own offering, Google Transit (which would’ve been a far better use of money, IMO). The icons are ugly and bland, the multiple grey tabs on top of the map completely eschew any purpose for the coloured tabs, not to mention how many clicks one has to make to view info such as the traffic cameras. And again, why take up 1/3 of the page with the stupid logo and colourful tabs, when what I really want to see is (a much larger) map, real time accidents and traffic cameras.
• The information integration is not there. I assumed that, when I first read about this site, I would be able to plan a trip going from, say, Langley to Nanaimo. Far short of that, sadly. First off, you can’t actually plan a transit trip, you can only view the bus routes. Secondly, all that talk about integrating regional transportation options - it actually means a link to BC Ferries website. There is no info about VIA Rail, nor is Greyhound even mentioned on the site.
• Useful transit info is not there. Okay, so they have the bus routes and SkyTrain plotted on the map. Don’t get me started on why the bus routes were done with the Google lines, whereas the SkyTrain was plotted in some completely different way. Click on a SkyTrain station, you think they’d have multiple pictures, station address, connecting bus routes, maybe even the station layout. Nope, all they have is the name of the station! Bus routes don’t have any info about which stops have what services, let alone any stop info at all! Select two bus routes, and they won’t be indistinguishable from one another, because they are both in blue!
• Cycling info is cool, but sucks. First off, I barely understand the difference between an “Alternate Off-Street, Alternate On-Street, Designated Off-Street, Designated On-Street” bike path, and I doubt any member of the public will either. It does not tell me which SkyTrain stations have bike facilities either.
• This info doesn’t help anybody. It’s hard enough to get people to plan their trip ahead of time. I don’t think having this site will encourage very many more to use it. The fact of the matter is, real time traffic info is only useful on the road and there is no mobile version of the site!

It’s a huge disappointment and makes me want to make my own version of the site. Too bad I don’t know how to code. There was so much potential with the idea of having this great all-in-one resource. I’d like to know what web firm designed this ugly piece of crap, and how much they got paid to do it.

There is one good feature of the site, and that is the trip calculator at the top of the site. It figures out how much is will cost, based on the price of gas, to drive somewhere, in either a car, truck, SUV, etc. Very cool feature. It could be better though, if it did something like Google Driving Directions, and you were able to plot an actual location and destination, and then tap into those gas checking sites to get the last available price, based on the start location.