In their continuing search to find some sort of relevancy, the Transit Police have a shiny new phone app that they have been promoting the heck out of.

It’s been live for more than a month, so cop spokesperson Anne Drennan released a statement touting its success. But the numbers are, frankly, underwhelming. From The Province:

In the month since the app was launched on June 19, a total of 315 conversations, comprised of 4,800 text messages, were recorded. Those numbers represent a 40 per cent increase in conversations with commuters via text compared to the month prior to the app’s debut. 

Okay, throw out the 4,800 text message number, as that’s just padding the numbers by counting every little emoji sent back and forth. The real number of note is “conversations” – actual, real, live people using the app to interact.

In 30 days, the app generated 315 conversations, about 10 per day. Shockingly, this modest number is actually 40% higher than the text conversations generated by the Transit Police’s highly-touted text message service (launched last year to even more promotion). Clearly the public isn’t racing to embrace these services.

But Jordan, you may say, surely it was a huge help during the recent high-profile SkyTrain snafus?

During recent system-wide shutdowns, Drennan said Transit Police logged 18 conversations on July 17, and 13 conversations on July 21.

Most of us know teenagers who log more conversations than that.

Suspiciously absent from these press releases: the cost to taxpayers of building the text message service and the app. I smell an FOI request coming on!