The TTC's new status page: everything is under control

  • Posted by Matt
  • Filed in City
  • November 26, 2007

TTC status
Some days, pointing out the flaws of the TTC isn't even as easy as shooting fish in a barrel; it's more like shooting ducks in a barrel. Imagine: a whole barrel full of ducks. How could you possibly miss?

The TTC (can I get a city-wide craze going around calling it "The Teet?") has launched a Subway/RT Disruptions page, which they will use to keep their ridership up to date about any service disruptions which may be occurring. The page evidently self-generates every minute or so, with a nice big tag line reading "There are no major disruptions at this time" in any instance in which there is... uh... no major disruption.

The disclaimer on the page already shoots the first hole in the usefulness of this information, with its hedging around the use of the word "major." What's major? A five minute delay during rush hour? A twenty minute delay at 1:00 in the morning? The collapse of the Bloor Viaduct?

The disclaimer also pulls out the puppy-dogs with the phrase "We do our best to keep this information current, but please keep in mind that our ability to maintain this status update may at times be limited." Can I get a chorus of "awww, poor little TTC?"

There's no syndication available on the page, and unless you're PDA-armed, the site's usefulness while on the go might be relatively minor. (That's "minor," the opposite of "major.") Also, nothing says professional like a badly pixellated haze of compression artefacts on the single jpeg image you bothered to toss onto the page to make it look pretty. And if you can find the link to the status page on the haze of 90s-era buttons and scrolling graphics on the front page of the TTC web site, pizza's on me.

OK, I'm whining my way clean through this grey, wet November Monday. I'll stop. The best thing about the page is that it finally cribs to the fact that the Teet's shuttle buses are not capable of carrying regular subway capacity in the event of an actual "major" problem. At long last progress!

Thanks to blogTO reader Laurence for tipping us off, and thereby making my day.

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So am I supposed to visit this page every time I plan to ride the TTC? That's quite the alert strategy!

Posted by: J at November 26, 2007 2:43 PM

thanks for the shout out there...
one good thing with Mac OS X Leopard (sorry for the obvious plug) is that web clip function for the dashboard... so I did a little web clip of the page and can check on my dashboard before heading out instead of loading the site and dealing with the mentioned 90s style graphics.
RSS this TTC... it's NOT THAT HARD.

Posted by: Laurence at November 26, 2007 2:44 PM

Actually that's a really good work-around, Laurence, thanks. I'm installing Leopard in the next few days...

Posted by: Matt at November 26, 2007 2:59 PM

Pros:
- Simple page layout that's accessible from mobile devices. Though I sincerely doubt this was the intention - most likely this is just low budget Web development at work.

- The 'Generated' info lets you know at least that the info was recently updated

- There are escape links at the bottom, but they assume you came from a certain place.

- That it exists at all


Cons:
- Using red as a font colour to indicate "There are no major disruptions at this time." is a no no. Green is soothing, and good. So is any other colour other than those that emergency vehicles use to identify themselves. Just because your logo is red, doesn't mean everything else has to be.

- The 'Generated' info is readable for two groups: machines and military officers. Formatting dates for real humans is both easy, and a good idea. Bump up the font size while you're at it.

- The workflow for determining if there are any disruptions is completely backwards. As a rider of the TTC, I'm going to assume things are running smoothly unless I'm told otherwise. Key word is *told*. This page is in desperate need of an e-mail sign-up at the very least (like GO Transit offers) but should be offering RSS feeds, SMS notifications, the works.

- The blurb of text preceding the status is far too long, and for the most part completely unnecessary. As Matt pointed out, it comes off as more of an apology than any sort of useful information. I'm in the prime of the ADD generation, and I didn't even bother to read it. Just give me the relevant info.

- The page design is totally inconsistent with the rest of the site, and clicking through from the Service Advisories page is a jarring experience. Again, kudos to them for (likely unintentionally) making the page mobile-accessible, but it has that "doesn't belong" feeling to it.

Posted by: Adam at November 26, 2007 3:12 PM

Making it an RSS feed seems obvious and useful.

Posted by: dave at November 26, 2007 3:16 PM

Of course nothing about Streetcars, just Subway/RT. It's the awful/constant disruptions on the surface that keep me away from the TTC.

Posted by: Jen at November 26, 2007 4:30 PM

This article got me thinking...

Check out the Facebook group "The TTC Website Project".

Can't change much about the TTC's service; we might be able to do something about that terrible homepage though...

step 1: get members...

Posted by: Brian at November 26, 2007 6:40 PM

I'm surprised it's not a PDF!?

Posted by: Freddie at November 27, 2007 12:10 AM

Clearly the TTC is aware of all delays great and small. Every morning on CityTV, Mika at "transit control" updates TV viewers on the reported delays. Why not transcribe and syndicate this for web users?

Posted by: Jerrold at November 27, 2007 8:51 AM

I dunno Jerrold, but I'm going with "no money, no time, limited computer skills."

Posted by: Matt at November 27, 2007 9:39 AM

Obviously the TTC is under enormous pressure to get with the times, but you half to wonder if these half-hearted attempts are better than not trying at all. Their usual strategy of just ignoring problems sometimes works, like keeping streetcars around until they became in vogue again, or being the last transit system on the continent that still uses tokens (how charming), or constantly rebuilding 1970s GM New Look buses (how retro!).

The NYC MTA has tried this sort of system for a few years now, with mixed results. When there is a delay that they bother to tell people about, a "service alert" icon appears at the top of their webpage. Clicking on the alert brings up a page not that different than what the TTC is proposing. It is done for buses, commuter trains, subways and more. Useful for when a certain isolated problem occurs but when major incidents affect the whole system it bogs down and won't load. The key is to make sure the icon only appears on the main page when something actually happens.

Posted by: uSkyscraper at November 27, 2007 1:09 PM

Giambrone!!! Fix this!!! :P

Posted by: Jerrold at November 27, 2007 1:09 PM

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