THE END OF AN ERA – HART Phases Out OneBusAway Usage

Starting today, you won’t be able to visit the HART OBA platform anymore. The screenshot above is of the old *Enterprise* version of the desktop OBA website for HART.

Post created on 04/01/2025

The sun is setting on something that I first wrote about back in March of 2013 (yes, 12 years ago).

If you missed my recent post, the Hillsborough Transit Authority (HART) is officially saying goodbye to the OneBusAway real-time transit vehicle tracking platform today. When OBA was first introduced in the early 2000s, HART became a small number of transit agencies to use it – alongside several transit agencies in the Seattle, WA area, New York City, & ultimately Washington, D.C. & neighboring Alexandria, VA. While the hope was for a ton more transit agencies to adopt OBA, this never came to fruition – as usage of competing smartphone-based apps like Transit & Moovit have grown exponentially since 2017.

While neighboring Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority (PSTA) tried out OBA integration in 2016, they decided in 2018 that they would not stick around for the long haul & officially endorsed the Transit App later that year. It would only take about 7 years more for HART to realize the advantages of adopting Transit App as their go-to for transit vehicle tracking & predictions. Other US transit agencies that officially endorse the app include:

Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority – Cleveland, OH.
Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority – Dayton, OH.
The Rapid – Grand Rapids, MI.
Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority – San Jose, CA.
Regional Transportation Commission of Washoe County – Reno, NV.
Greater Richmond Transit Company – Richmond, VA.
Rochester-Genesee Regional Transit Service – Rochester, NY.

A screenshot showing some of the benefits provided by HART’s *Royale* subscription.

Some of the agencies that actively endorse the Transit App also pay for the app’s premium subscription service called Royale. With Royale, users will have access to unique app themes & access to additional features such as the ability to show more nearby routes & departure times in a single session.

Now, if your particular transit agency does not partake in a Royale subscription, you may purchase an individual one on your own. However, basic app functionality can be achieved without a subscription.

Now for me personally, I am not a heavy user of the Transit App & generally only use it in situations where I might not have studied a particular transit agency well enough to know how to get around. For getting around the Tampa Bay region, as well as getting around portions of the San Francisco Bay Area, I’ve tended to use other avenues.