People traveling to and/or from Bet Shemesh have suffered for a long time with horrible traffic conditions. The worst part of it is probably that one can never know when to expect traffic or a clear road. In the middle of the day the highway can be backed up all the way to Shaar Hagay, as it can happen in the middle of the night. not just during rush hour. One can never know. and more often than not it seems to be backed up.

My friend Dani Waxman created an app that will help you plan accordingly whether to take Road 38 or to find an alternate route. And, you can check it well in advance to give yourself an idea of what to expect.

Road 38 is a simple app. All it does, I think, is tell you how much time it will take to travel between Shaar Hagay and Bet Shemesh (the BIG intersection), and vice versa.

At first i was skeptical. I thought it would always just say 1 hour, or 45 minutes, when it is really should just be a 7 or 8 minute ride.

Last night was really the first opportunity I had to use it, when I actually remembered to use it. I was coming home late from a wedding and I know at night right now there is construction on the highway with alternate road driving arrangements, meaning you can wait for a long time before being able to continue driving, adding 0 or 15 minutes easily to your trip. I considered possibly checking on Waze the time difference of getting off by Latrun and the coming down to Bet Shemesh via the 44 or the 383.

Checking the Road 38 in advance, I saw that it claimed the ride from Shaar Hagay would only be the minimum 7 minutes.

Happily it was pretty accurate. I only had to wait about 30 seconds in an alternate lane driving arrangement, and I was home pretty quick.

So, if Road 38 app can help you, i.e. if you drive to or from Bet Shemesh with any regularity, it is available as a free download from the Google Play Store for Android and from the Apple Store.

Some upcoming features include: