On Friday the Metropolitan Transportation Authority of New York released their brand new iOS application for iPhone and iPod Touch users. The app has been long awaited for the residents of New York that will now allow them to see real time information for the 1, 2, 3 and 4, 5, 6 lines along with the 42nd Street Shuttle.

As excited as New Yorkers should be, there is still much work to be done including the completion of a new project that will allow cell service and wi-fi underground. Until this is completed, which is projected to be finished in 2016, this will strictly be an above ground application and according to The Wall Street Journal,

The new app covers only about a third of the subway system, and agency officials acknowledged that it will likely take years of work and hundreds of millions of dollars in new investment before conveniences increasingly common elsewhere are standard in the Big Apple.

For one of the largest metropolitan cities in the world, this has been long overdue. The Bay Area Rapid Transit or BART, has had an iOS application on Apple's App Store since it was opened to the public in July of 2008. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority has been outsourcing its data to third-party developers for some time now and The Chicago Transit Authority has had real time subway information available since last year.

An Android and Windows version is said to be in the works but is being made by third-party developers with no release date information.

Download the free app here: MTA Subway Time