Do you use a GPS navigation device to get around? For many of us, these things have been a welcome relief to pulling onto a shoulder or into a parking lot and getting out the mapbook or, worse yet, asking for directions (a guy thing). With all good things, though, there could be an additional price to pay — a number of companies that manufacture navigation devices are beginning to work with companies who want you to know that they are there, or that they are at least a block or two away. Companies like Dunkin’ Donuts are paying the device makers to have the location of their stores pop up on your screen when you are getting close to them. After paying $800 or more for one of these devices, I think most drivers would be happy just to have the information they want relayed to them without anything extra. Of course, you could make the same argument about advertising on that television set in your living room.
Linking to all things transportation
I’ve told you before about CommuterPage.com, the fine Web site put together by the Arlington Government. This site aggregates all sorts of transportation information and gives you links to transportation articles (like this one) as well as resources such as Commuter Connections and local bus services. Now, the District government has launched a similar site that focuses, not surprisingly, on issues and resources in the city. The site was launched Friday and is in beta mode, meaning that you can have an impact into the way it looks and works when completed. You can find it at GoDCGo.com. It’s a little sparse right now and not all of the links on the page contain information but it looks like a good template for what could be valuable to residents and visitors. Now, if it could just tell me when to find a parking space near the Uptown Theatre on the first night of that big new movie I’ll be happy.
Happy commuter
Our good friend Transit Ben is a happy camper: “Since you said you don’t get happy satisfied e-mails, I’m happy and satisfied because [last week] the Montgomery County Council appropriated $5 million for the final design and engineering of a new south entrance to the Bethesda Metro. When the Purple Line is built, this will be the connection between the two lines in Bethesda. If construction funding can be worked out during the next 12 months (and the County Council offered to help pay, even though Metro is normally funded by the state in Maryland), the new entrance could be open by the summer of 2009. Even better, this would represent the first shovels in the ground toward building the Purple Line.”
A lot of transit supporters have been jumping on this new entrance as a sure sign that the Purple Line (connecting Bethesda to Silver Spring and New Carrollton) is going to get built. They are still several hundred million hurdles in the way and each of them have a picture of a dead president on the front. It’s kind of like building the on-ramp and then waiting for the interstate to get built.
Questions, comments, random musings? Write to [email protected].
