Metra on twitter

Happened to do a search on twitter for Metra and there are a bunch of twitter pages. One page is a general site that lists overall delays and there are a bunch of pages specific to most of the 11 lines. Again delays specific to a line are "twitted" onto its dedicated page. Still learning how twitter works and reviewing each of the pages.

Now there's something that should have been discussed in the hit piece (er, I mean the Tribune article) from a couple of days ago. For those who sign up, a twitter account could definitely be helpful for those who wish to receive immediate, real-time announcements to their cell phone/PDA concerning service delays. It's likely a similar setup will be available on Metra's redesigned site later this year...

I received a few tweets today on one BNSF train that was delayed yesterday afternoon due to a late turn of equipment. The tweet I received is exactly what's listed on the service disruptions page of the Metra web site.

A few of my flickr friends and i tweet each other when we see certain things. IE I saw an IC SD70 at 16th st. yesterday, and i tweeted them.
http://twitter.com/FranklinC55
http://twitter.com/benlikesbikes
http://twitter.com/AKAGoldfish
http://twitter.com/jdawg09

You should join us.

Speaking of Metra on Twitter, a daily Metra commuter and software engineer from Park Ridge that works for Google developed coding that can deliver service advisories directly to a cell phone.

http://www.railroad.net/forums/posting. ... 66&t=60364

Making Metra trains go 'tweet'
Commuter rigs Twitter to distribute Metra's advisories

By Richard Wronski | Tribune reporter
March 25, 2009

If you've ever hurried to the station only to discover your train is running late, veteran commuter Tony Zale feels your pain and offers a free antidote: Metra updates via Twitter.

Metra provides advisories on its Web site ( http://www.metrarail.com), but Zale realized commuters often have no time to sit down at their home computers before going to work.

It's much more convenient to get a tweet about late trains, said Zale, 34, a software developer from Park Ridge who rides Metra downtown.