Even before I arrived in gorgeous San Diego for a 2-week vacation, everyone was telling me to rent a car, or if possible, take Uber or Lyft. My generous high school buddy, who had invited me over, offered to lend me one of his cars, but I declined graciously for several reasons, which included my hatred for driving, traffic, and parking fees, and my lack of confidence in using today's auto tech. In fact, the last car I drove had a cassette deck, didn't have any navigation equipment, rear cameras, or even support for MHL cables.
Note: Having wrote technical documentation on the MHL standard, I actually had an MHL cable in my toolbox, but never actually used it inside a vehicle.
However, even without a car, I was able to explore absolutely lovely San Diego in two weeks. Sure, there aren't any skyscrapers to web-swing from and wall-crawling was useless with duplex houses and bungalows, but the unfairly much-maligned San Diego Metropolitan Transit System was excellent for getting around.
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| The MTS buses are comfortable and generally on-time. |
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| A running joke in Wonder Man's 90s series was Simon Williams not owning a car in Los Angeles. This turned out to be even more accurate today in South California. Screen shot from Wonder Man #1 (1991). |
Today's generation of smartphone and GPS users are so dependent on their gas guzzlers that they forget that Google's mapping system was designed in the US and is tested and verified more than in other countries. I had been working so long in China, where all Google services including Google Maps is blocked, that I had forgotten how efficient and accurate Google Maps is when it comes to its public transport tracking system.
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| Google Maps on the Sony Xperia C3. |
Whether it was a downed trolley stop due to flooding (San Diego had recently experienced a flurry of rainy days), the time of bus arrivals, or the name of the stops, Google's data service was up to date and useful. As someone who grew up with paper maps and a sense of direction that is nowhere near as good as Professor Henry Jones Jr's, I was spoiled with Google's directions and public transport advice.
Continued in San Diego, Google Maps, and the MTS Bus System Part 2
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