I Built a Bay Area Transit App to Solve My Own Commute
Like a lot of folks in the Bay Area, I rely on public transit—BART, Caltrain, Muni, AC Transit—to get around. But keeping track of routes and schedules across all these providers was more frustrating than it needed to be.
So, I built Commuter: Bay Area —a clean, reliable app that brings schedules from every major Bay Area transit provider into one place; real-time transit info, right when you need it.
Aryaman Sharda
The Problem
I was using 3–4 different apps just to plan my daily commute. One had decent schedules, another showed delays, and none of them covered every agency I needed. Even the ones that looked okay were bloated with features I didn’t care about.
I just wanted one app that could quickly tell me when the next train or bus was coming at the stops I care about—without making me dig through menus or switch apps.
What Commuter Does
Commuter gives you real-time transit info for every major Bay Area provider:
- BART
- Caltrain
- SF Muni
- AC Transit
- VTA
- Golden Gate Transit
- And 40+ more…
You can check departures, view live ETAs, and quickly add routes from any agency to your dashboard. It’s built for people who want fast, reliable transit info without extra steps.
Built with SwiftUI and Vapor
The app is built entirely in SwiftUI, with a Vapor backend that fetches and processes real-time data from 511.org.
Sharing models across the iOS app and backend made it easy to iterate quickly and keep everything in sync.
All the routing, filtering, and presentation logic is handled locally in SwiftUI, while Vapor handles syncing schedules, delays, and agency metadata.
Why It’s Useful
Whether you’re heading to work, catching a train into the city, or checking weekend schedules, Commuter Bay Area makes it easy to see what’s coming up next. You can check real-time departures for the stops you care about and get going—without bouncing between websites or dealing with clunky interfaces.
Aryaman Sharda
If you’re in the Bay Area and use public transportation regularly, give it a try. And if it saves you time, a quick share or review goes a long way.
Built to solve my own problem—but maybe it solves yours too.
What’s Coming Next
This is just the start. There’s a lot more we want to build into Commuter Bay Area to make it even more useful:
- Notifications – Get alerted when your train or bus is arriving soon
- Route delays – See disruptions and service changes in real-time
- Reminders – Set custom alerts for your regular commutes
- Widgets – Glanceable info right from your Home Screen or Lock Screen
If there’s something you’d love to see in the app, let me know—I’m always looking for feedback.