
The Need for More Transit APIs - apievangelist
http://blog.apievangelist.com/2011/09/11/the-need-for-city-transit-apis/#.Tm0f6f64djk.hackernews
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mnutt
The NYC MTA seems to have done an about-face from "you can't have any data,
and we'll sue you if you do get it" [1] to opening up their data and holding
app contests:

<http://mtaappquest.com/>

I'm still waiting on a real-time train schedule API, but they've come a long,
long way.

[1] <http://iplj.net/blog/archives/1346>

~~~
sudonim
My team built the software powering the contest. We aren't involved with the
API though. I'm happy to help anyone with questions - Colin at challengepost
dot com

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davepeck
You might be interested in the Walk Score Transit API. In addition to
surfacing a "transit score" for a given area, it also provides a simple
RESTful way to get stops and routes at a given lat/lon:

<http://www.walkscore.com/professional/public-transit-api.php>

The Walk Score API is built on top of the GTFS Data Exchange web site and
APIs. GTFSDE is a clearinghouse for the latest GTFS data worldwide:

<http://www.gtfs-data-exchange.com/>

(Note that raw GTFS from agencies is often quite buggy -- the Walk Score API
does a ton of work to clean it up and fix errors.)

Finally, the City Go Round web site and API surfaces apps that make use of
transit (and other local) data:

<http://www.citygoround.org/>

Hope these are interesting for you!

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apievangelist
Great suggestions. Very interesting...thanks for sharing.

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ajays
I don't know why transit agencies don't just open-source and make available
the raw data they have. Often I see them trying to put together "apps" or some
such gizmos, when the reality is, if they just made the underlying raw data
available (in a reliable manner), someone will come along and build apps for
them on their own dime. The transit agencies would rather spend money hiding
the data, and then more money building some crappy app, than open the data and
get all the labor for free. They just don't get this whole "open-source"
thing.

~~~
jbermudes
The underlying issue is that some agencies can't for some odd reason or
another give out their data. There is either some archaic policy in place or
for some historical/contractual reason the data isn't actually owned by the
agency but instead by some contractor that provides the technology to generate
the data. Some smaller agencies might not even have a department that is aware
of that issue/possibility because they once again subcontract it all out and
the contractor isn't going to suggest to release data for free to get free
projects.

The best way to change that is to request it at the local level. If local
developers put pressure on their transit agencies then that will help speed up
the process.

~~~
ajays
I agree. A lot of times the contractor who built the system will either (a)
see the value in the data, and put in a clause walling it off, or (b) try to
obfuscate the data so it's not easy to get to, so that they'll get more money
to free the data.

SF's MUNI had a huge mess on its hands with the whole NextBus thing.
Eventually the developers prevailed, but this is SF, where you can't throw a
stone without hitting some developer. Imagine the situation in not so tech-
heavy cities.

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aaronbrethorst
Considering that you have a picture of a Seattle bus on your blog post, I'm
surprised you didn't mention OneBusAway.

The sad irony is that Seattle is most likely going to lose its best source of
near-real time transit information because the author is going to work for
Google on Google Transit: [http://onebusaway.blogspot.com/2011/06/future-of-
onebusaway....](http://onebusaway.blogspot.com/2011/06/future-of-
onebusaway.html)

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apievangelist
One bus away is definitely on my list, this was just first in a series of
transit API related posts.

~~~
aaronbrethorst
i look forward to the rest of your series, then :)

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Stumppi
Very interesting article. I am currently working on a project called
opentimetable.net, providing tools for the community to collect timetable raw
data, something similar to openstreetmap (osm), but for timetable data.
Actually, the project is tighly connected to osm as I am pulling static
infrastructure data from osm which is already available or is becoming
available sooner or later (stops, lines, etc...). Within opentimetable.net,
the user can then enrich that data with timetable information. Of course, data
will be available to the public. I already cooperating with some german
transit agencies.. I hope to get other agencies involved in the future. I have
also implemented a route planner for public transit data which I will put
online once a minimum of data is available...

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aristidb
This seems to be pretty "complete": <http://code.google.com/p/public-
transport-enabler/>

It's used by Öffi
([https://market.android.com/details?id=de.schildbach.oeffi...](https://market.android.com/details?id=de.schildbach.oeffi&feature=search_result&hl=en))
AFAIK.

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justincormack
London is getting sane after a start when they didnt get it.
[http://www.tfl.gov.uk/businessandpartners/syndication/defaul...](http://www.tfl.gov.uk/businessandpartners/syndication/default.aspx)

There is a lot of data, producing a coherent model across different places
will be hard, for a comprehensive model.

~~~
iand
I've started modelling based on the GTFS data model. The schema I've created
so far is at <http://vocab.org/transit> \- it's close to GTFS, modified by
conversations with other transit data developers. Example of data using this
schema is at <http://beta.kasabi.com/dataset/mta-new-york-city-transit>

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truebosko
The TTC (Toronto) has been pretty good about this, especially lately.
Initially releasing real-time APIs for our streetcar routes and now every
single bus route has realtime, GPS based methods.

Info found here: <http://toronto.ca/open/>

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Benjo
There is a website scraping based API for realtime data in for the
Minneapolis/St. Paul area here:

<http://metrotransitapi2.appspot.com/>

Source is on github

