Turn Metro’s logo into poop.

Today began the latest significant, partial-shutdown of Washington, D.C.’s train system to try and fix major structural issues and decades of neglect.

Most of the stations on the eastern end of the Orange Line are closed for a month. A MONTH. For that next month I’ll be taking a bus to a shuttle, that shuttle to a far-flung station, and then ride a train into work. (I wish we could afford a second car.)

This morning it took me two hours to get to work. I hate this.

Continually interested in applications of augmented reality, I’ve been messing around with AR a lot as of late. So, using an app called Aurasma, I’ve set it up so that when you scan an instance of Metro’s logo it gets replaced with the smiling poop emoji.

UPDATE: Sadly Aurasma is no more, but this idea still gives me joy

It doesn’t work perfectly. A lot depends on your phone’s camera, the lighting, what you had for lunch, and how close to the logo you are. You kinda need to get up in there.

Yes, this is a bit mean-spirited but after years of awful commutes, people getting hurt/dying, and now multiple instances of these “SafeTracks” where nothing appears to change, it seems to me a little smiling poop is fair.