Play Foursquare, ride BART, win discounted passes and maybe the envy of your friends. Courtesy: BART.
While Facebook helps you keep in touch with friends and Twitter provides real time sharing of articles and news, Foursquare, the latest social media game, puts socializing on a whole new geographic level, and they’ve just teamed up with Bay Area Rapid Transit.
So how does Foursquare work? Instead of telling friends what you’re doing or what you’re reading, Foursquare let’s you tell your friends where you are and makes neighborhood exploring a game. As a user, you can check-in at a hip new restaurant and let your friends know what the best dish is. Do this enough times, and you can earn the “Local Badge.” Better yet, become the most frequent visitor, and you can become the “Mayor.”
Regular BART riders can earn a BART-themed badge and additional perks. This winter BART is awarding $25 tickets each month for Foursquare users who check-in at BART stations. Users can also become a mayor of one of BART’s 43 stations, and the competition is fierce. New mayors and ousted mayors are relayed via BART’s live twitter feed.
It’s not all just a game though. Users have noted some pretty cool things, like great local restaurants within walking distance of BART stations, quirky facts on street performers, and other interesting shops and kiosks.
At Way2Go, we’d like to see more collaborations that encourage transit use, like Foursquare and BART, as well as other social media tools, like San Francisco County Transportation Authority’s Cycletracks and New York MTA’s open source data app. These are great ways to get people out of their cars in a way that’s fun, social, and useful.