U. student develops RURadar app to map campus buses
Earlier this year, Tadhg Jarzebowski, a School of Arts and Sciences sophomore, launched an iPhone app, RURadar, to help students track the campus bus fleet.
Jarzebowski spoke to The Daily Targum about the app's creation and why he felt compelled to build it.
He said he felt frustrated with the switch to Passio GO! last summer and wanted to create something better, so in September 2023, he began spending his free time teaching himself how to build an iPhone app.
Students have indicated difficulties with the new app, especially as it broke down on the first day of classes during the Fall 2023 semester, as previously reported by the Targum. Some said they preferred TransLoc, which preceded Passio GO! as the University's primary bus-tracking app.
"It was pure hatred for Passio GO! I looked at that thing, and I was like, 'No.' I didn't know what anything did — everything was janky about it. It was just like a car that was falling apart. You didn't want to be in it," Jarzebowski said.
He said he is studying computer science and has built other web-based applications, but this was the first time he tried creating an iPhone app.
After approximately three months and paying the $100 developer fee to Apple, he launched a test version of the app only available to his friends and asked them to try out the app and share feedback, he said.
Jarzebowski said he had approximately 15 people testing the app during this development period before launching it to the public in January, right before the start of the Spring 2024 semester. The app has since received more than 1,000 downloads from the App Store.
RURadar uses the publicly available data transmitted from the buses to Passio GO! and displays it in a unique format and map with an improved user experience, he said.
Some of the features unique to his app include the ability to see the bus routes' stop order, which is especially helpful on weekends when the buses operate on confusing routes, he said.
"You can order the stops alphabetically or by distance closest to you (on the Passio GO! app), but that doesn't make sense if you want to know what direction the Weekend 2 takes, for example," Jarzebowski said.
Another feature is the number of buses in service for each route, which gives users a clear idea of service levels at any given time, he said.
He said the app is only available on iPhone because the coding language is very different and more manageable to learn than for Android.
Jarzebowski said that while the project has been fun, there have also been many challenges.
Some issues with the app include the inaccuracy of the estimated arrival times of buses, which is due to Passio GO!'s system. Another element he is working on is adding arrows to the bus icons on the map to clarify in which direction a bus is traveling.
Another issue he has faced is coding errors that can lead to the app crashing for users. When this happens, he has to work to fix the code and then release an update, which can take 24 hours because Apple has to review all updates.
Jarzebowski said the app has been an exciting project, and he hopes it will help teach him valuable skills for any future career.
"It's nice to think that I will be building things like this in the future. I like to build tools that people like to use, and it might not always be apps. It could be websites, it could be something else," he said.
