I’m Jeff on the Google Maps product team. Together with user experience ( @laurenmae ) and regional ( @andregoog ) teams we’ve been working on bringing new capabilities for Lagosians to life for the past year. We want to make sure Google Maps is helpful when planning your travel around Lagos, including the information we’ve added, such as danfo and BRT directions, current traffic conditions, weather, bus stop busyness, and expected danfo fare levels.
Today we’re excited to launch a new directions experience in Lagos for all Android users, with suggested routes that cover all the ways you might walk, take a keke or okada, or use danfo and BRT to reach your destination. You’ll now also see an estimated fare range, expected travel time, and Street View imagery of the stops on your route. If you click on the images, you’ll be able to pan around Street View and orient yourself. When you’re in an unfamiliar place, this makes it easy to know where to come down from the danfo without bothering the driver or conductor.
With this launch, we want to give you an opportunity to ask us anything about the new Google Maps Traffic tab and danfo routes in Lagos, Nigeria in the comments below. Feel free to ask us anything about the new features and our development process. We’ll do our best to answer all questions. You can post your questions in the comments section below until December 16, and we’ll respond by December 20.
This is amazing @albertsonj !! I am so excited to see this feature live on the Maps. No doubt, more people will now see the need and usefulness of the Maps even when not behind the wheels. Thanks for your efforts in developing the ease of commute around Lagos for commuters @andregoog. Congratulations on this feat and cheers to all Lagosians. Great efforts @laurenmae. Super excited about this!
Great efforts and exciting news to hear @albertsonj . For the feedback, here is what I have to say.
How do you intend to provide an informed estimated fare for Danfo buses?
There is a regular fare for many routes across Lagos from bus stops to bus stops, but sometimes these prices are not consistent. How do you intend to handle price surge for Danfos?
The Danfo drivers operate solo and set their prices themselves, we the passengers decide which to enter base on the cheapest fare that is available. If I may ask, the estimated prices you talked about, is it real-time? P
for early morning trips are different from night trips. For example, I spend 200 naira on a morning trip from Ojota to Obanikoro, but in the evening, I pay 100 from Obanikoro to Ketu, with an increased destination this time around. What steps are you putting in place to guide the user so as to make an informed decision?
To achieve this, did your team work with Lara.ng? Our local transport info startup.
How long did it take to develop this feature? And again, was it users behavior gathered through analytics that informed the choice to develop this feature?
I want to understand what led to the feature idea and it’s implementation. If it has always been part of the Map’s roadmap or it was users driven.
Thank you.
By the way, I think Google map has positioned itself into a utility app, where lots can be done to easy peoples lives commuting wise. Big ups to the product team @albertsonj
This would help a lot in Lagos. More areas should be covered. How can Local Guides in Lagos help with this?
Also a how to use post would be appreciated as I checked my maps now and it’s either not updated or I haven’t figured how to use it the right way. Thanks
Hello @iamdarola , thank you for reaching out to us.
This feature is supported only in the most recent Android version of Google Maps (version 10.28). After installing this version, some users may not see the new features until a few hours later, after the app has automatically refreshed certain settings.
Good job! This would be really helpful to Nigerians.
However, I already tried out the app and there are some mistakes/misdirections. For example, going from the university of Lagos to Ile iwe bus stop Ikotun, one can get a tricycle going to mushin from the university of Lagos and then take a bus going to ikotun from Mushin and highlight at Ile iwe. But the map directs me to get to yaba first, then take mushin, then isolo etc The directions are not straight forward. Is there any way we can edit?
Thanks for the encouragement, @Mayford - and for being a part of our Local Guides workshop in March to give us valuable, local feedback on its earliest versions!
We started thinking about this feature (and doing research in Lagos to support it) in the first half of 2018, but our engineering effort started in earnest just earlier this year.
Our decision to do this was informed mainly by what we heard from the community in Lagos, when we began to ask questions about how Google Maps was or wasn’t helping them get around the city.
As for analytics, we did notice that transit features in Maps weren’t being used as much in Lagos as in other big cities around the world, where we already had complete coverage of all the modes of transport. We wanted to bring about a big improvement for Nigeria’s (and Africa’s) largest metropolitan area.
We would love to have the help of Local Guides in Lagos to make this feature better, and help us identify things we may have missed. Please feel free to leave feedback as a comment on this Connect post, or use the Send Feedback link in the Android version of Google Maps. To access this, tap the menu at the upper-left in the home screen, then tap Send Feedback, and use the “Your opinions about Maps” category to send us your thoughts. We’ll be monitoring both places.
Hi @albertsonj , thanks for this feature, i was recently in US and this feature on google map help alot. I was able to see when the next bus will be available and the current location of the current one i am in, however i don’t seems to find the feature of tracking BRT buses in this one for Lagos. Should we expect this and if yes what is the ETA for this?
Hi @rebirthtobi - Thanks, and this is a great question. In the places where we show real-time bus positions and arrival times in Google Maps, we are relying on the local transport operator to provide that information to us (it usually requires them to install specialized equipment on their buses). BRT buses in Lagos don’t have this capability quite yet, but we’re hopeful it may come along soon, because we agree, it’s super-useful to have!
This is awesome!. A great feat for Lagosians suffering constant congestion. @albertsonj , i am happy to hear that you reached agreement with BRT operators on installing a regulatory device. If they will install it, it will help in ways like updating prices and movements. BRT prices are relatively steady, but that of Danfo and KEKE depends heavily on demand at a particular time. For example, from Cele bus stop to Agor palace-way in the morning is #50 on keke but from Agor to Cele in the morning is #100. In the evening it will go the other way opposite . this is because in the morning more people are going out for work and business but return in the evening. I think with time, this great progress with get much better with user feedbacks.
Well done and thank you so much @albertsonj , @laurenmae@andregoog and all the google map product team
This is a nice feature and I find it really helpful especially for newcomers to Lasgidi.
I noticed that when routing a commuter to enter Danfo, it does not give a variety of Danfo to enter.
Someone going from CMS to Four Point by Sheraton should have options of taking Ajah bus or Lekki bus and not just Ajah bus (as is suggested by the app), this saves the commuter some fare and time waiting for a bus to get filled.
