The New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) recently achieved a major milestone with its Bus Time™ initiative. Riders have sent one million text messages requesting public transit information since the service launched its first borough-wide expansion in January 2012.

Bus Time provides customers with real-time information on the nearest bus; they need only text a bus stop code or intersection to receive a text stating the location of the next bus to that location. It currently serves all local and express routes serving Staten Island, as well as two routes each in Brooklyn and Manhattan.

“The MTA is streamlining commuting by connecting riders with timely transit information when they need it—on the device they use most, their mobile phone,” said Jed Alpert, chief executive officer and co-founder of Mobile Commons, which powers the text messaging capability of Bus Time. “The million-text milestone shows just how useful Bus Time has been and how commuters have adopted it into their lives. We look forward to many more milestones as the program expands across the city.”

An expansion of Bus Time technology to the other boroughs of New York City is underway. Over the next year, more than 6,000 buses and 14,000 bus stops will be upgraded in an effort to make Bus Time fully operational city-wide by the end of 2013.