Portland-based Metro bus service is offering free rides Friday to coincide with the First Friday Art Walk and the launch of web-based ride-tracking tools for its buses and other public transit in the region.
Officials from Metro formally unveiled the new tracking tools at an event in Monument Square Friday morning. Metro will offer free rides between 4 p.m. and the end of service Friday.
The Southern Maine Transit Tracker gives passengers the ability to check on the status of their ride in real time and plan their trip down to the second. The program uses a trio of services – a website, third-party smart phone apps like Moovit, Transit App, and Google Maps, and a text messaging system that keeps riders informed about the time a bus will arrive at a specific stop.
Ed Suslovic, a Portland city councilor and chairman of the Metro Board of Directors, said Metro staff had been working on the system for years. Metro officials hope that giving riders certainty on when their buses will arrive will boost ridership.
The launch coincides with Portland’s First Friday festival, which regularly attracts 3,000 people onto Congress Street and other parts of the city to visit galleries and museums and watch street performers.
A lack of parking is the number one complaint people have about First Friday and is a perennial problem for any event in downtown Portland, said Jennifer Hutchins, the executive director of Creative Portland. In an effort to reduce congestion, Creative Portland partnered with Metro to offer free service on every bus route for First Friday, hoping that people leave their vehicle at home and, armed with the new ride tracking tools, take the bus instead.
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