The early June Friday fun poll sought answers on how you want your real-time information on the new mobile site. One hundred eighty-four (184) of you responded to the poll, which shows how much interest there is on this subject matter! Here’s how you responded to the poll questions:

We presented three ways the future mobile site could provide you with information on your trip. You can get real-time information by: (1) bus stop, (2) route or (3) by the location of the user. Not surprisingly, only 14 people or 8% of those who participated in the poll said “No” to this third option.

The next question we asked was how to display the information itself when it comes to differentiating between scheduled times and actual times. Most of you (133 or 74%) said colours were the way to go. Only 47 people (26%) said a symbol was the best way to differentiate between the two times.

There were a lot of great comments about this question like these:

Brad

“In regards to  Question 2, colours are usually difficult to use from a usability standpoint. People have various forms of colour-blindness, so using colours for some sort of important information usually leaves these people in the lurch.

Further, you have to take the devices people will be using into account. On my iPhone, colours get washed out in bright sunlight. Bright sunlight might be a concern in Vancouver if it ever comes!

Using some other means to differentiate between real-time and scheduled times would be better than using colours. Italicized fonts, or the suggested asterisk.”

Cliff

“Why not both? Either use both colours and symbols or have an option to switch between them. You could even go as far as having the user select which colours they want to use (as there are many different types of colour-blindness).

When push comes to shove, however, and only one option must be selected, colour is my preference.”

Tim Choi

“Another option is what Seoul does – say WHERE the next bus is (name of the last stop it was at) rather the estimated time of arrival.”

The third and last question the poll asked was on the frequency of how often the site will update information. I was a little surprised by the results. I knew updating once a minute would win against updating once every couple of minutes, but in our fast-paced world, I didn’t think that as many as 80 people (43%) would think that updating every two minutes was good enough. In total, 104 (57%) thought once a minute was the best way to go.

Thanks to all of you who completed the poll. As many of you know, we’re changing our mobile site with the goal of getting a new and improved version up and running by the end of this summer. Keep your eyes on this blog for updates on the progress of the site and more opportunities for feedback. Our mobile team has been very interested in your feedback and in reading all of your comments, so keep them coming!