Of course, now that SEPTA buses are on Google Maps, the need for this is a bit reduced. If you have a smartphone, you can find out what time the last bus home is before you even leave the bar; perhaps ensuring you have enough time to down that last beer before the PLCB comes in and takes it out of your hand.

The real question on everyone's mind, however, is when we're going to see BusView appear to complement TrainView. And after that, when will we see the two of them mashed together into a Google Maps view of live transit location data goodness?

Photo submitted by Ray Skwire.

801 meets the rails for the first time.

The interior of 801.

The cab of 801.

Silverliner V 801 hangs out with Budd Silverliner II 256.

Originally announced a few weeks ago by Harry Garforth at a CAC meeting, it was later revealed that Garforth got a bit ahead of himself and SEPTA had not yet made an official decision on the matter.

The Rs will be removed and the lines will be renamed based on their current endpoints. The one exception being the Norristown line, which will become the Manayunk-Norristown line.

Communications director Elizabeth Mintz insists that SEPTA will be swift in replacing all signage which currently references the R designations. Hopefully SEPTA will use this opportunity to put their new signage initiative into overdrive, finally eliminating dated and destroyed maps and signs that are still prevalent at some outlying and Center City stations.

It will be sad to see the Rs go away - it's the final nail in the coffin of a system that was never realized. I previously wrote that I would love to see the full through-routing system be implemented, but that will never happen. In light of that, this move makes sense. If the lines will never be paired off on schedules, then keeping the pairings serves no real purpose. No more pairings also effectively means an end to differentiating the Reading and Pennsylvania sides of the system, since each paired line contained one endpoint from each side.

Do I complain to SEPTA or the Center City district about this one?

Notice the ridiculous amount of gravel in the shelter? Just behind the camera is this massive pothole crater, which has been there since the first snowstorm in early February.

I call 311 to report it every few days, and then a cone gets placed in it and run over a few hours later. When it fills with water, the passengers waiting in the bus shelter get a massive spray of runoff and gravel every time a car plows through. I'm honestly surprised no one has blown a tire on it yet.

Submit your SEPTA snapshots! Post them to Flickr or your favorite photo-sharing site, and then email the link via the feedback page.

Of particular note are the comments of one blogger:

Colin Weir, who runs the transit blog septawatch.com praised many of Philadelphia's changes, particularly the introduction of an online route planner similar to the one unveiled by the TTC last week. He also lauded Philadelphia's enthusiastic use of Twitter to give customers service updates.

But he said Philadelphia still needs a lot of work.

"They really need to work on the cleanliness of the system. [That's] what I would say my biggest gripe with them is."

Check out the full story, plus the video. Worth noting is that the video leaves out my positive comments and leaves only my cleanliness comment.

Submit your SEPTA snapshots! Post them to Flickr or your favorite photo-sharing site, and then email the link via the feedback page.