Google Transit comes to Australia

Stuart Corner
Tuesday, 18 March 2008 10:36

Your IT - Home IT

Perth has become the first city in the Southern Hemisphere to be served by Google Transit, Google's online application that integrates Google Maps with public transport route and timetable information to enable users to plan routes between two different locations.

The service was launched in the US in 2005 and is now widely available in North America, Japan and Europe (a full list is available here ).
Announcing the launch at a Google press conference in Sydney, Alan Noble, head of engineering for Google Australia and New Zealand, said the company hoped to expand coverage to all major towns and cities in Australia, but that this was dependent on local public transport organisations making their timetable information available in a suitable format.

To be comprehensive the service will also need timetable information from many privately-owned bus companies, and Noble said "we have a XML transit feed format (available here )  which we make available and if transport companies make their information available in that format we can use it."

He did not respond directly to a question of whether all public transport providers in Perth had participated, saying: "That is part of the quid pro quo. Either they opt in or we find some middle ground to make it happen."

He would give no indication of when the service might be expanded to other cities in Australia, saying: "We really do depend on agencies to provide us with information so I can make no predictions...We have had some preliminary discussion with [transport bodies in other cities]...I would really like to see Sydney and Melbourne covered this year...Hopefully other transit organisations around Australia can see what we are doing [in Perth] and get excited."

Noble added that "Google Transit was a 20 percent time project one of our engineers had an idea and it was develop from concept to project and is now a product."

Throughout Google engineers are encouraged to spend 20 percent of their time pursuing projects of their own choice. According to CEO Eric Schmidt, "things that interest them rather than what their bosses tell them to do." Schmidt, who also addressed the press conference, said: "almost all of the really really interesting products [in Google] have come out of 20 percent time."

Google Maps originated in Australia, with a company called Where 2 Technologies which was bought by Google in late 2004 and resulted in Google opening an office in Australia.