The City of Guelph announced a new partnership with the Transit app this week, meaning transit users get enhanced features on the app for free.
“We are excited to announce our partnership with the Transit app to provide Guelph Transit users with free access to the Royale subscription. When anyone in Guelph opens the app, it will automatically switch to the Royal subscription, opposed to the free version,” said Robin Gerus, general manager of transit operations for the city.
The upgrade unlocks features like more trip suggestions, real-time vehicle locations on the map, the location of the next-arriving vehicle on all transit lines, information on routes farther away and later departure times.
“When riders plan a trip in the Transit app and activate GO mode, their phone’s location is used to provide step-by-step navigation. The GO feature guides you from your front door, through one or multiple transit connections, all the way to your destination. Users can view service alerts in app or subscribe to receive push notifications for their favourite routes,” Gerus said.
It’s something that’s been a long time coming, according to Steven Petric of the Transit Action Alliance of Guelph, who said a former Guelph Transit driver had been advocating for the switch since even before TAAG was formed in 2017.
“It took too long, in our opinion,” he said. “This is a good partnership for the city.”
“It’s a very user-friendly app. It gives you trip planning and notifications and real time updates, and it’s also used by other transit agencies like the TTC and Go Transit, so you can get very complete data using the live information,” he said.
“It also shows bike lanes and Uber and walking distance and all those things too. So it’s a really comprehensive app.”
While TAAG is thrilled about the announcement, Petric said they are “curious” about how much the partnership is costing and how sustainable it is in the long run.
“Sure, it’s free, but when does that money run out? That’s our only concern. But otherwise, we think it’s the best move the city could make.”
