He pulls out all the stops

Jean-Paul Larocque spent six months building an intricate Spokane travel Web site giving bus riders maps and directions for the quickest route from Point A to Point B. In part he did it just to help him get around; the 23-year-old self-taught programmer doesn’t drive a car.

The site he created – EnrouteSpokane.com – is distinctly basic in some respects. The Linux-based online bus-route tool operates from a computer buried in his apartment closet in north Spokane.

It wasn’t that easy to build, the modest Larocque admitted with prodding. He started in June and released the early version in November. It uses large datasets of route information obtained from Spokane Transit, but also relies on a mathematical algorithm for finding the shortest path in a computerized graph.

Initially he called the site Trip Planner. When Spokane Transit announced its own bus-route planning site was about to launch, Larocque renamed his EnrouteSpokane.

His first version was simply a guide to the fastest walking routes in Spokane County. Then Larocque added bus routes after studying similar services offered by such cities as Portland.

Even though EnrouteSpokane is still a beta effort, the site does things the newly launched Spokane Transit Trip Planner tool doesn’t.

The official STA site – Spokanetransit.com – was created for Spokane by Arizona-based transit software company Trapeze Group. Trapeze got roughly $23,000, according to STA communications manager Molly Myers.

STA officials knew Larocque was developing his own site, but it was generally assumed he was doing it as a student project. Larocque contacted the agency in 2007 and obtained bus route data for his project. He also uses GIS data on the city of Spokane’s Web site.

His and the STA site look similar, both offering a choice of a starting point, departure time and destination.

In a comparison test, both provided several options for going from 1400 S. Bernard to 3600 E. Sprague with a 2:50 p.m. start time.

Asked for the least-walking option, Larocque’s Enroute said take bus 44 downtown, then transfer at the Plaza to an eastbound bus to the destination. Total time: 53 minutes.

STA’s Trip Planner provided several choices. Its quickest was to the 44 in the other direction out to 29th and Freya, where the route becomes the 33, heading north to Freya and Third. One would have to walk three blocks or so. Total time: about 37 minutes (with walking time added).

Both sites produce maps that show a graphic of the routes suggested.

Larocque’s Enroute also lets someone choose the quickest total time with the option of walking when the time is less than waiting for a bus. In that scenario, the tool tells one to walk about a mile from 14th and Bernard to the bus plaza and catch the 90 to Sprague and Freya. Total time: about 38 minutes.

Both systems allow one to enter landmarks – libraries, schools, hospitals – in the start or finish box instead of exact addresses. The STA site renders results faster than Laroque’s, in part because his site is home-built.

Larocque holds two part-time technology jobs in the Spokane area. He said he hopes to use the Enroute site as a business calling card. He would like to use his programming skills for other cities looking to design similar sites.

“I wish I had started a year earlier,” he said, “because I might have been able to get the STA bus planner site up quicker” than the agency did on its own.

STA considers the Enroute project as a one-man experiment. “We do not endorse the use of his site,” said spokesman Chris Tohm.

Mark Curtis, the STA customer service manager, noted that the agency changes its routes and times periodically, and unless he adds the data, Larocque’s site will be out of date.

Larocque said he can track the transit agency’s changes and input route adjustments.

While Spokane riders now have two online choices, another larger player could get into the game within two or three years. Google has just introduced a beta version of a mapping system called Google Transit.

Google’s marketing office said it has maps and transit schedule information for roughly 30 agencies worldwide, including in Portland, Seattle and Vancouver, B.C. For those cities, when you search an address with Google Maps, the service will provide an option to “take public transit.” To see a list of the cities included in Google Transit, visit www.google.com/transit.

Google spokeswoman Elaine Filadelfo said it’s not certain when Spokane’s data will be added. And for now, Google Transit is ad-free while the company expands its number of cities covered.