News
Student Assembly working to develop Jitney GPS tracking app
By Kirsty Warren ’18
November 13, 2015
Throughout the semester, Student Assembly (SA) has been discussing the development of a Jitney GPS tracking app. Acting Director of Student Activities Noelle Niznik said that the trackers are already active and will be able to follow the two jitneys and the late nite shuttle for this weekend. A test run will begin today, including members of the Student Assembly Leadership Team, Andrew Fischer ’17, Silvia Radulescu ’17 and Zach Oscar ’18.
Jitney Coordinator Gabe Rivas ’16 said there were additional features he and his co-coordinator, Jeanette Parra ’16, would like to see from the app, but they nonetheless “immediately saw the benefits of an Jitney app for the students. We could have the potential to provide an easier way to notify students of the schedule for certain days and have the ability to alert students of any delays in service quicker than email. This would apply to both regular jitney and Late Night as well.”
Assistant Director of Physical Plant for Business Operations Alfio LaRocca said that the initiative began after he read the SA email containing meeting minutes a few weeks ago and saw the suggestion of adding GPS to the Jitneys. “Since I also agree that our Jitney Service would be enhanced significantly with a simple GPS tracking system, I identified a local start-up willing to work with Student Assembly to customize an affordable, user friendly app exclusively for Hamilton College. After doing so, I contacted [Niznik] to get her feedback, and gauge her interest. She was completely on board so arrangements were made to move forward.”
Rivas commented, “At the moment, Student Assembly is working with software developers from TracManager, a GPS tracking app that allows you to see the location of vehicles on Google Maps by means of a GPS transponder installed in the vehicle.The app is currently very much in its testing phase, meaning that there are many things that the app lacks that we coordinators believe it should have.”
Suggestions proposed during the Nov. 2 SA meeting included adding other campus vehicles and setting up a messaging system for when people are stranded off-campus, although it was argued that this would be unproductive since the Jitney has a schedule to follow. During the meeting, Rivas inquired about including a list of the scheduled stops with the respective stop-times, and a feature that would allow someone to send out rider alerts via the app.
“Several creative ideas and upgrades surfaced during the SA meeting attended by the Jitney GPS app designer,” LaRocca said. “Although only some of the changes will be incorporated when we go live tomorrow, all are possible. The remainder and any that surface will be incorporated as soon as practical, provided that the SA is pleased with the results of the app. We can abort at any time.”
Rivas expressed concern that, in the current state, the app might be difficult to read since the scheduled stops or stop-times are not highlighted on the map. At the Nov. 2 meeting, TracManager software developer Wei Lee said he would speak to his colleagues about integrating these features.
“Jeanette and I strongly encourage all students who use the service, both Regular and Late-Night Jitney, to download the app,” Rivas said. “We could use the input and feedback from everyone to make this app the most helpful it could be or find the proper alternative. We also encourage all students to reach out to either me or Jeanette (grivas and jparra, respectively) with any feedback or suggestions.”