At home or in the office and not sure where a bus goes. Use Bus Route on your desktop for a detailed map
that can zoomed showing the entire bus route for a bus number. Bus routes can change over the day so
Bus Routes overlays all paths the bus route can take. When at the bus stop, use Google maps on your mobile
to get the current bus route and bus times.
Select bus route
Change direction
Using Bus Route
It may surprise people but during the day the route a bus takes changes over time. At the start of the day
early in the morning or late at night as buses start up only a short section may be used until the buses
start covering the full route. Even then at certain times of the day the route may change. Bus route
takes all the bus paths for the bus route and overlays them so you can see the entire route which can help you plan
your trip. However, when at the bus stop it's best to use Google maps so you can see where the bus travels at
the current time and what times the bus departs and arrives.
After Bus Route starts select the bus number to show the bus route and click Update.
Zoom in and out to see the level of detail you require. Bus routes are most often in two directions
so when you zoom in check which side of the road the bus is driving on. If it's not on the right side
of the road for you, then tick the Change Direction box and click Update
When at a bus stop the bus numbers are shown at the bus stop. If not at a bus stop, such as when looking at a location
not near you, you can use Google maps on your mobile where bus stops appear as blue bus icons on the map.
Click on the bus stop icon and Google maps shows the bus numbers using the stop.
If you zoom in on the Bus Route map, blue bus icons are the bus stops. The blue line is the bus route
which is displayed when you select a bus number using the select drop down list above and then click Update.
If you'd like to know when the next bus comes use Google maps on your mobile and click on the bus icon.
Then in Google maps select the bus information to show the bus times. On a mobile phone if you'd like to see the bus route
for the current bus you can click on the time for the bus. The route and bus route numbers are not currently available
on a desktop computer.
Keep in mind with Bus Route different times however may show different routes, whereas
Bus Route shows the entire route the bus number covers, which can be handy when planning a trip. Also Google maps
only shows the bus route once you select the bus number, then the bus time, whereas Bus Route shows the route
without drilling down further.
The change direction shows the bus route going in the opposite direction.
To see the direction zoom and often on main roads such as freeways, you'll see the lane the bus route is in.
The route the bus travels can sometimes have small changes at certain times of the day. All the routes the bus takes
is shown on Bus Route which can sometimes appear as multiple paths along the same route.
If you select change direction and no route appears, it's because there's no other direction.
E.g. the 280 and 282 buses only travel in one direction.
However the two separate routes basically cover the same route but in opposite directions.
Also try zooming out as sometimes the bus route may be outside the map shown on the screen.
The route shown is for the entire route for the bus number. Buses with the same bus often don't travel the entire route,
such as at the start and end of the day, or travel with small changes to the routes.
It is best to check the timetable to make sure the bus travels on the
route and to the stops you want, when you wish to travel.
The Bus Route site was created as I could find no other site which showed the routes.
Other functionality such as bus stops and bus times can be easily found on Google maps on mobile, but not the enitre route.
Use Bus Route in conjunction with Google maps on mobile to give you the information you need.
To check the numbers for the buses that stop at a bus stop, click on the blue bus icon in Google maps mobile for the stop you are interested in.
Remember to pick the side of the road you are interested in.
Zoom in as much as is required. When you click on the bus icon the list of bus numbers will appear.
You can then use Google maps on mobile and check the when buses will arrive.
The bus route information appears to be quite detailed. Often at shopping centres I don't know where the bus I want leaves from,
so I have to go up and down checking all the stops. Now I can zoom in, select the bus I want and where the bus leaves
from is shown, sometimes with enough accuracy for the shopping centre so I know where to go.
This won't always work, but it may prove useful in some cases.
There's times when I'm at a bus stop and I'm not sure where each bus goes.
Depending on where I want to go, I often have a choice of four buses. Now I can quickly check which bus goes where.
There are times where I'm going somewhere and I need to take a bus for the remaining section of the trip. By going
to the location where I need to end up, I can check using Google maps on mobile, which buses go to or near the location, and then work out
what other transport I need to use to get to the desired bus.
In the top left corner of the map is an icon which enables you to show the map taking up the full screen. This makes
it easy to enter and exit full screen mode.
Use the zoom in and zoom out buttons to zoom in or out of the map. You can also zoom in and out using a pinching
motion on your screen.
Reposition the map by dragging the map with your mouse or finger.
Sometimes if can take a while for the map to update. Keep in mind some bus routes may have a dozen or more sub routes
and all of those sub routes are mapped so you can see the entire route. For most bus routes the map will update quite quickly.
Source: Data licensed from Public Transport Victoria under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence.
