Smartraveler

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Transportation

Official Website: Smartraveler
Location: Online
Cost: Free

Others to Consider: E-Traveler / Mass Turnpike Authority, Massport & Logan Airport, MBTA Schedules, Tips & Information, MassachusettsGasPrices.com, Mass RMV - DMV

Smartraveler provides Boston area commuters with accurate, up to the minute traffic updates to help avoid heavy congestion and accidents.

Using the Smartraveler interactive map, you can click on any major roadway that they monitor and find out the status of traffic.

Reviews

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Smartraveler Accuracy -- Or Lack Thereof, Fri 14 Dec 2007

I first started using Smartraveler to receive traffic reports by phone in 1992. Back then, when you keyed in a route for which you wanted information, the report would start off with the time the report was generated. In this way, you always had a sense for how fresh -- or stale -- the report was likely to be. Unfortunately, they stopped doing this time stamping many years ago, and in so doing, compromised the service tremendously. Today is 12-13-07. Those of you in the Boston area will recall that we had our first severe winter storm of the season today. I called from work to get the report on Rt. 128-S. Nearly an hour later, I called again, only to hear the exact same report admonishing listeners of an accident in the area of Rt.20 in Waltham. What good is a report that is nearly -- or perhaps more than -- an hour old? Additionally, tonight I'm observing that the information reported on their website is quite different than their telephone-based reports. The website shows that the Mass. Pike has severe delays from Boston all the way out to Natick. The phone report however indicates that traffic is moving well all along that same route except for severe delays at the Weston tolls. Which report should I trust? One report would entice me to take my chances, while the other would cause me to seek an alternate route. Smartraveler is marginal at best. The reports are frequently stale, and without the spoken time stamping they used to provide, you can never tell how much to trust the report. I cannot imagine why they abandoned the time stamping! When they did that, they turned a half-way decent service into a lemon. I'm giving them a rating of two stars instead of one only because the service is free.