The Official National Train Map Sucked, So I Made My Own
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Hi HN,I’m a junior developer. I wanted to share a side project I’ve been working on.The national railway carrier (BDZ) has no public API. They have an official map but the UI is quite dated, often lags, and doesn't show the full route context.I wrote a short write-up about the process here: https://www.pavlinbg.com/posts/bg-train-trackerI know it's still rough around the edges (I'm still working on it), but I’d love to hear your feedback or suggestions!
HN · launched Dec 21, 2025 · 77 upvotes (top 14%) · 0 views
Niche: public transit tracking software · 42 launches, 3 in the last 7 days ▼ -57% · Explore this niche →
Category and tags
- Travel & hospitality
- Content generation
- B2C
- Not AI
- Hobby / open-source project
Visit website ↗ Source listing ↗
More like this: all 42 launches in public transit tracking software →
Could you build this?
Yes The project scrapes railway website endpoints to track transit schedules and delays, rendering them on a standard interactive map UI like Leaflet or Mapbox.
Discussion
20 comments analyzed.
Competitors mentioned: Hungarian train info website (kozlekedesiklub.hu/vonatinfo), Dutch spoorkaart map (spoorkaart.mwnn.nl), Amtraker.com, OpenRailwayMap, Official transit apps
Concerns raised: Arrival/departure times display in hundreds of minutes instead of hours:minutes format, Train icon easily mistaken for bus icon, Tooltip covers up highlighted route, Lines around forms too faint for peripheral vision, Data may be hidden by authorities if showing poor service
Feature requests: Add zoom +/- buttons for accessibility and desktop usability, Fix train detail panel on desktop - make floating or sidebar instead of fixed bottom, Auto-detect OS language and theme settings without prompts, Search box as primary element at top of interface, Train dashboard at top next to settings icon
Competitors
Other products that read as similar to this one : 86 launches clear the similarity bar, closest 8 shown.
Attention rank: #14 of 87 (itself plus its competitors, highest first, normalized so YC and Product Hunt are compared fairly).
Launched 30 days after the earliest competitor.
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