Problem with Frequencies in GTFS feed -- need help

[Transit001]

Hello,

I am having a problem with coding a Google Transit GTFS feed and need
some help please: I've been finding that the (optional) Frequencies
table ("frequencies.txt") does not seem to function at all when used
in a GTFS feed. At first, I used the schedule-testing application
(which is downloadable from Google Transit) on sample test data with a
Frequencies table, and I found that only the absolute times in
stop_times.txt are reflected in the results. The Frequencies table
seems to be completely ignored. I initially thought I must be doing
something wrong or that there might be a bug in the schedule-testing
application, but I've gone back and reviewed the sample live test feed
of "Demo Transit Authority" in Beatty, Nevada that is linked off of
the GTFS specification page on Google, and I'm noticing the same
effect to be true here. (This demo is at:
http://www.google.com/transit?ttype=dep&saddr=North+Ave+at+N+A+Ave+Beatty,+NV&daddr=W+Cottonwood+Dr+at+A+Ave+S+Beatty,+NV&ie=UTF8
.) In this unit test, the fictional bus route being used is "CITY",
the trip on this route is "CITY1" (the opposite-direction trip is
"CITY2"), the source stop is "NANAA", and the destination stop is
"EMSI". When trying to plot the route I find that no matter what
desired day and time I enter for "Depart at", it only shows a
departure from "NANAA" at the following occurrence of 6:06 a.m. and an
arrival at "EMSI" at 6:34 a.m. This is roughly consistent with the
absolute times in stop_times.txt, but it seems to violate the
intervals in
frequencies.txt, which has entries for periods throughout the entire
day from 6:00:00 to 22:00:00 (10 p.m.). If I try to search for a
route at noon, for example, it will return that the next available
trip is at 6:06 a.m. the next day, when it should really return
something on the same day.

Is the functionality of the Frequencies table in GTFS still in beta or
having any known bugs? I have browsed some of the publicly-accessible
GTFS databases from PublicFeeds, and it appears that almost all
agencies don't use the Frequencies table except for a few entries with
very long-term periods (i.e. a whole day), and rather brute-force/
generate the list of times in stop_times.txt.

Am I doing something wrong?

[Joe Hughes]

Hi "Transit001",

For help debugging a particular feed with Google Transit, I'd
recommend the Google Transit Partner Support group found at:
http://groups.google.com/group/google-transit-partner-support

There is an issue with the frequencies in the version of the sample
feed that's served in Google Maps; we'll be fixing that soon.

Thanks,
Joe Hughes
Google

On Feb 12, 2:51 pm, Transit001 <abcdz...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I am having a problem with coding a Google Transit GTFS feed and need
> some help please: I've been finding that the (optional) Frequencies
> table ("frequencies.txt") does not seem to function at all when used
> in a GTFS feed. At first, I used the schedule-testing application
> (which is downloadable from Google Transit) on sample test data with a
> Frequencies table, and I found that only the absolute times in
> stop_times.txt are reflected in the results. The Frequencies table
> seems to be completely ignored. I initially thought I must be doing
> something wrong or that there might be a bug in the schedule-testing
> application, but I've gone back and reviewed the sample live test feed
> of "Demo Transit Authority" in Beatty, Nevada that is linked off of
> the GTFS specification page on Google, and I'm noticing the same

> effect to be true here. (This demo is at:http://www.google.com/transit?ttype=dep&saddr=North+Ave+at+N+A+Ave+Be...

[Transit001]

OK -- so then it's not a bug in the Frequencies table overall, then?
I mean, it seemed to me that the feed data in the public example is
sensible and that the system is just ignoring it. Once it's fixed I'm
hoping I'll be able to go in and see what the difference is that gets
it to work, and I'm hoping this will be verifiable in the Schedule
Viewer app on my end.

Also, isn't the Google Transit Partner Support group private to
agencies that have already been officially approved? I'm trying to
get a certain agency registered but I'm not really sure how much of
the feed had to be done in order to be able to register and for the
Google Transit team to set up a test session for the feed -- I thought
that if I could get to the stage of having at least the test session
set up then I could see if I could get the Frequencies table to work
when it didn't work in the Schedule Viewer.

Thanks

> > Am I doing something wrong?- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -