1. Most accurate arrival times (this matters _a lot_ for transfers)
2. If your trip has transfers, it takes into account how long it takes to walk between platforms (some apps assume its instant, but if it's a large station it can take the better part of 10 minutes to get to another train)
3. Tells you which part of the train (forward, middle, back) to sit in so you're closest to the exit when you get off
4. Service changes are accurate and automatically included in the routing
5. Powerful routing options -- if it's raining, you can prioritize routes with less walking, or if you have a Citibike membership you can create routes that combine biking + transit, etc.
It's honestly good enough that I pay $20/year for it. Every once in a while I give Apple Maps or Transit a shot, but they're just not on the same level.
I'm not sure if this is the case with Citymapper. Transit does offer alternatives, but I don't think I've ever encountered this with Citymapper, i.e., you're committed to a particular route once you start. With Transit, I often get a suggestion (while on the train) that I might not make it in time for my connection with X train, and the next Y train leaves in Z minutes. I feel with Citymapper I only get something like this if alternate trains were part of the initial route segment, eg, N/R/Q trains. I also feel Citymapper does a much worse job updating ETAs or arrival times for alternative trains than Transit.
It's also surprisingly useful to have two mapping apps on mobile devices which otherwise make it difficult to have two separate routes open at once.
Citymapper is also much quicker to incorporate changed schedules and excludes delayed / cancelled trains from results within minutes of the changes being announced.
For altered schedules, Google is not only slower to react but also just posts a generic link to the TfL website - and you then have to parse the TfL notice yourself to understand which stations / bus stops are closed etc. The routes suggested by Google also still include cancelled trains / buses - it's your job to double check by visiting the TfL / train operator's websites.
Some cities, like the Park City area in Utah, integrate the busses and Via vans into a single app to optimize the use of both. Citymapper could do this in-app in the future, creating chained transit options.
Also, the app oozes personality.
Marius here - VP Engineering for Citymapper (powered by Via)
We are excited about the opportunities this creates for the product and team. We are looking forward to join an excellent tech company. Happy to answer any questions.
And we are hiring as we are expanding our product and team. For openings to work on the Citymapper app and tech please visit https://citymapper.com/jobs or write to marius@citymapper.com
Could you give an idea about the tech stack powering citymapper?
We run a large deployment of services to support millions of daily active users across the 450+ cities that the Citymapper app operates in - all on AWS EKS. Most of the code of the backend services is written in Python and we have CPP and some Go services or modules as we deal with a lot of CPU and memory intensive workloads (eg routing) as well as high I/O workloads (we are using 1000s of different data sources)
The apps and SDK are written in Kotlin / Swift / React
If you can identify a niche and keep your costs down then you might have a chance. Apps targeted at enthusiast cyclists continue to do well, for example, although I have my doubts about expenditure vs revenue for some of them. (Disclaimer: I run a small-scale cycle routing app/site.)
But "people who want to get around Western European and North American cities" is not a niche that Apple/Google were ever going to overlook.
[1] "Citymapper investors are mostly not making their money back in the transaction and that it’s effectively a washout": https://techcrunch.com/2023/03/16/via-acquires-trip-planning...
Apple and Google tend to be slower to add suggestions like this because they scale poorly to other cities. But it's only a matter of time before they add them.
This never seems as useful as it should be because I'm missing a reliable way to know which direction a London Underground train will approach from?
There is a red stop light, but many stations have these at both ends of the platform. Is there some signage or other piece of infrastructure that gives it away?
I've also had issues with Transit surfacing incorrect bus routes based on cancelled buses (but scheduled) which CityMapper somehow could account for. Transit knows the next scheduled bus two minutes away isn't "live" (icons are different) but still surfaces it as a primary suggestion, while Citymapper wouldn't.
The crowning feature of Transit is the GO trips that let you share you location while on a bus with others. For bus arrival accuracy there’s nothing better. It’s probably saved me a flight or two before, by just making sure I get the 747 bus to the airport.
i do like that the departure times are (slightly) more accurate because of the crowd-sourcing. however, the underlying data from metro is a mess, so they end up looking bad anyway because trains and buses still show up (or don't) unexpectedly due to metro's unreliable data.
I really doubt that after less than 5 years it will be rolled into Via.
Is there any thriving UK startups still around acquiring US companies? It seems that the news I see is US company acquires UK startup when I don't see the other way round.
Really makes the UK startup scene just a european HQ for US companies at a discount.
But London is where most of the innovative high-paying firms are. So tech workers are in a bind: move to London for a nominally high-paying tech job but get fucking hosed on rent and travel costs, or stay in the regions and work in a lower paid, less interesting firm. There isn't much real difference to your standard of living.
It's not just the absolute level of rent either; it also goes up faster. People don't want that kind of liability, you need a raise just to stay in place, and raises aren't forthcoming lately.
And it's not easy to get a London-tier salary while working remotely from rural Yorkshire or something. They've been tamping down hard on that kind of thing.
The housing market is rigged for boomers and it's strangling Britain's growth. Forget freedom of movement with Europe; I'd like freedom of movement inside my own fucking country first.
(And all of the above sounds similar to NYC and SF -- it is, but London's salary upside is nowhere near as high as those places. And Americans have several big metropoles to choose from, we only have the one.)
I did apply to citymapper at some point to no avail unfortunately.
Citymapper is definitely hiring now. https://citymapper.com/jobs Or feel free to contact me directly on marius@citymapper.com
They've dressed up the announcement so much that you can't even understand what they're announcing.
(More text, less pictures...)
https://ridewithvia.com/news/via-acquires-citymapper-to-expa...
(Edit: When I say informative... it's unfortunately still dripping in marketing-speak fluff).
Have recommended it to so many people. Biking wouldn't be the same without it.
As others have pointed out, their core value of routing/planning/exploiting Open Data became heavily commoditised by Apple, Google, and the transport operators themselves (e.g. TfL in London). Their belated attempts to monetise payments, data, even running transport itself, haven't been successful: it's a crowded, aggressive market filled with long-time incumbents who have established relationships and deep strategic control points.
As a place to work / founder values... ..well, the reviews on Glassdoor speak for themselves. I can't say I'm grieving for its loss.
