Google to give Hub bus riders heads-up on arrival

And the T was nowhere to be found when Google first joined with transit agencies more than five years ago to incorporate schedules and station locations into Google Maps.

The MBTA was not added until 2009, after other major cities like New York and Chicago, a lag that prompted 1,500 people to join a “Put the MBTA on Google Transit!!!’’ Facebook group.

“For the T, it’s a little bit of a coming of age,’’ Davey said. “Now, we’re one of the first and certainly the largest [transit agency] in the United States’’ to work with Google on predictions.

In addition to Boston, the real-time predictions will begin today on Google Maps for San Diego, San Francisco, and Portland, Ore., as well as for Madrid and Turin, said Noam Ben-Haim, Google Maps product manager, in a phone interview from Zurich, where his development team is based.

He said they have been working to add predictive data to Google Maps for the past year, amid requests from riders and agencies alike.

About 200 million different mobile users now visit Google Maps at least once a month via Android, iPhone, BlackBerry, and other devices. That represents about 40 percent of all Google Maps searches, and mobile users are gaining on desktop surfers, said Anne Espiritu, Google spokeswoman.

Boston commuter rail and subway predictions will be next for Google Maps, though neither the company nor the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority revealed a target date.

But arrival predictions provide arguably the greatest benefit for bus customers, who outnumber commuter rail travelers more than 2 to 1, with nearly 400,000 daily riders spread out among nearly 200 routes and 8,000 stops.

While subway riders who miss their train typically wait only a few minutes for the next to arrive, bus riders sometimes wait an hour or more, particularly at night, on weekends, and on less popular routes. Boston traffic also wreaks havoc on printed schedules.