Overview

Seattle Bus Monster helps you find bus stops near you, buses that are arriving at your bus stop soon, and it lets you set alarms to notify you when you need to leave to catch your bus.

Bus Monster is a meshing of the functionality provided by Google Maps, King Country Trip Planner, and University of Washington's ITS Web Services, with a touch more added in. This site with inspired by HousingMaps and BusView. Google Maps provides an easy-to-use map interface with detailed road maps and satellite imagery. Trip Planner lets you find bus stops in and around the Seattle area. And, ITS's Web Services provide up-to-the minute estimates of when the next bus will arrive at many of the bus stops in Seattle. Mix them all together and you get Bus Monster.

To try Bus Monster out, click on any of the example links displayed when you first visit Bus Monster, or whenever you reload the webpage. You can also follow along here to see more detailed examples of how to use Bus Monster.

Finding bus stops

To find bus stops near a certain location in the Seattle area, switch to "Bus Stops" and type in the address, intersection, or landmark near where you want to look. Or, without typing anything in, find bus stops near the current center of the map. Note that the format for addresses and intersections is different from Google Maps--you won't need to add a zip code or city name to your addresses. The following are examples of recognized inputs:

• 611 Pine
• 45th & University
• Sea-Tac Airport

If you specify an ambiguous location, you will be presented with multiple matches to choose from. Once you specify a recognized location, you will see the 5 closest bus stops to that location. Click on an individual bus stop to find out when the next several buses are scheduled to arrive at that stop.