If you have gone out for a walk, or to the grocery store, and wondered why so many people are out and about when they are being implored to stay at home during the coronavirus crisis, Apple on Tuesday released a new online tool that is designed to give a look at how well people are adhering to the ongoing shelter-in-place edicts.
Apple said the mobility tool uses data gathered from Apple Maps requests for driving and walking directions, as well as public transit information, to provide a look at the degree by which people in a specific area are going out in public. Anyone who wants can use the mobility reports located on Apple’s COVID-19 information page by entering the name of a country, city or geographic region. Apple uses January 13 as its data starting point, and updates information on a daily basis.
Apple said the purpose of the data is to help contain the spread of coronavirus and “provide helpful insights to local governments and health authorities and may also be used as a foundation for new public policies by showing the change in volume of people driving, walking or taking public transit in their communities.”
Several Bay Area counties implemented shelter-in-place guidelines in mid-March, and the rest of California, and much of the country, soon followed suit. A search for “San Francisco Bay Area” in the Apple tool shows that routing requests for driving have fallen 70%, while those for public transit are down by 84%, and walking request directions have fallen 79% since Jan. 13.
Nationally, since Jan. 13, driving request information is down by 63%, walking requests have fallen 66%, and requests for public transit information have plunged by 81%.
Apple has tried to build a degree of user security into its mobility tool, as it neither tracks the exact locations of individuals, nor does it show people’s specific information requests.
The Apple tool does have some limitations in that it doesn’t show data for entire states and only includes information from requests made with Apple Maps. By contrast, a similar offering from Google provides the option for data on specific counties in the United States.
