Technology on wheels: Select San Francisco’s Muni buses now feature Wi-Fi and touch screen maps noting the schedules of connecting and intersecting lines.

I like the idea - and hopefully it will be simple enough for travelers to use and figure out, saving time for both visitors as well as commuters.

Some critics say it’s money being spent in the wrong places - and that the touch screens and various on-board technologies will be targets for vandalism. Hopefully this won’t happen. ok won’t happen to a level where it wasn’t worth the installation.

It would also save energy for some if the screens had an option for “Spare some change?” And then the screen could display the many variations of “Sorry man, No.”

“This is a smart bus in every way, shape and form,” Newsom said. “You can download music, you can play video games. It’s a bus where you are connected. It’s constantly generating information about your connection to the rest of the Muni system.”

The bus, part of Muni’s hybrid electric bus fleet, is painted green and black with a picture of Mother Earth and an electronic display panel boasting “270 tons of CO{-2} saved” and other “green” messages. But what really makes the bus different is inside.

SF Gate article. More at Cisco at www.theconnectedbus.com