Red Line Rush Hour Service Change - April 3

[ctaweb]

Hello, developers.

 

Just a quick note about some new destinations you'll see for a while in Train Tracker...

 

For work to renovate the 95th/Dan Ryan station and bus terminal areas, there's a service change that'll be implemented starting Monday where some Red Line trains during/around rush periods go from Howard to Ashland/63rd, and some trains departing from Ashland/63rd will be marked as Red Line trains and go into the subway after Cermak-McCormick Place and head up to Howard as Red Line trains.

 

This means that you will see some Red Line trains from Howard leave with a destination of Ashland/63rd at stops from Howard down thru Roosevelt (where they then will then go out onto the Green Line and make all stops to Ashland/63rd).

It also means that at South Side Green Line stations from Cermak-McCormick Place thru Ashland/63rd, you'll see live estimations in the data for some Howard-bound Red Line trains as well as Ashland/63rd-bound Red Line trains, at the appropriate platforms.

 

Lastly, some schedule-based departures from Howard, similar to how we just say they're toward "Howard or Loop" on the Purple Line during rush or just "63rd Street" on the Green Line for trains that haven't yet left Harlem/Lake, will show as "95th or Ashland/63" in the data for flexibility pending live data with more specific information. This new destination value will only occur on schedule-based, SB results thru Roosevelt, as a fallback for when live data is unavailable (in the same way we revert to schedule in Train Tracker, today). Example (XML version):

 

 <eta>

   <staId>41190</staId>

   <stpId>30228</stpId>

   <staNm>Jarvis</staNm>

   <stpDe>Service toward 95th/Dan Ryan</stpDe>

   <rn>818</rn>

   <rt>Red</rt>

   <destSt>0</destSt>

   <destNm>95th or Ashland/63</destNm>

   <trDr>5</trDr>

   <prdt>20170403 15:19:27</prdt>

   <arrT>20170403 15:26:27</arrT>

   <isApp>0</isApp>

   <isSch>1</isSch>

   <isDly>0</isDly>

   <isFlt>0</isFlt>

   <flags/>

   <lat/>

   <lon/>

   <heading/>

 </eta>

 

The APIs themselves are not changing--this is just a heads up about some destinations you'll see soon, not dissimilar to when unusual destination descriptions appear during weekend work events. These changes have also been in the latest GTFS for a while, if that's part of how you extrapolate stopping patterns and lists, as FYI.

 

You can learn more about this planned service change at http://www.transitchicago.com/travel_information/alert_detail.aspx?AlertId=40115

 

You can also learn about the project at http://transitchicago.com/95thTerminal

 

Thanks, as always, for using our data in your apps.

-tc/cta