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December 2023 - What you need to know before 2024

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GTFS Digest

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Dec 20, 2023, 12:34:22 PM12/20/23
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The GTFS Digest is a resource generated monthly by MobilityData providing an overview of developments on GTFS.
 
GTFS relies on community contributions. Please help us capture GTFS developments by sharing your updates for our next digest to: specifi...@mobiltydata.org

We really value your feedback on this first release and would like to know how we did. We invite you to fill out this form and help us achieve the full potential of this tool.


🏅 Contributor Shoutouts

Moved the GTFS Trip-Modifications proposal to the Pull Request stage and collaboratively engaged with the community to facilitate its progression to a voting phase. This is effective advocacy in action!

Shoutout for redacting your first issue #409 with great clarity and high detail. Very elegantly put!

Hats off for delivering meticulous reviews on active Pull Requests, this is pure gold!

Shoutout for contributing in your first PR #412 by bringing editorial corrections to the attention of the community.


🚀 Recently Adopted

This proposal focuses on adding the Dataset Publishing & General Practice guidelines, and Practice Recommendations for all files into the GTFS specification's reference file. This represents the second phase of the merging of Best Practices into the GTFS specification as outlined in issue #396.

[GTFS-Fares v2] Add networks.txt & route_networks.txt #405
GTFS-Schedule and GTFS-Fares v2 data are not always produced by the same organization/departments, and they are not always updated at the same frequency. This proposal allows the production of Fares and Schedule Data separately.


🗳️ Currently Voting

Remove Best Practices content merged into spec (Phase 2) #60 
After PR #406 merged specific best practices directly into the GTFS specification, this proposal removes the duplicated content from the Best Practices document, consolidating a single source of truth. 
  • Vote closes on 2023-12-26.

📂 Active Proposals

GTFS-Flex #388 
The GTFS-Flex proposal allows passengers to discover demand-responsive services on trip planners
  • It has undergone multiple discussions and is currently being reviewed by contributors.
  • Most recent GTFS-Flex Working Group Meeting held on November 1, 2023:
    • Agreed on dedicated foreign keys in stop_times.txt for issue (google/transit#398).
    • Reverted to using location_groups.txt and removed its references to location.geojson ids (google/transit#397).
    • Maintained pickup_type=3 restriction for hail-and-ride/taxi-like use cases (google/transit#400).
  • Check out the last outstanding issues here and here
Trip-Modifications are modifications done to a trip to modify its shape, remove stops that are not served, and potentially add temporary stops. Trip-Modifications is mainly used for visualizing detours and updating realtime predictions.

The rule_priority field defines the order of priority in which matching rules are applied to legs, allowing certain rules to take precedence over others. Its presence acts as a trigger, shifting the empty semantics from "anything except" to “doesn’t affect matching”.


🔥 Most Active Conversations

Modifications to the GTFS Governance: Phasing Plan #413 
MobilityData suggests refinements to improve both the formal amendment process and informal aspects of GTFS governance. Included in the issue are common community-identified problems and a proposed phased plan.

Some routes are designed to be operated with both trains and buses depending on the trip. In the current GTFS specification, the "type of transportation" is a routes attribute and as such, cannot elegantly handle such use cases.

Slack conversation in #mobilitydata 
Melinda would love to get your insights on Best Practices for feed consumers and app developers. She asks: “all the best practices so far are intended for GTFS creators, right? Has anyone thought about a separate set of best practices for developers working with GTFS datasets?”

Steve could use your help to answer these questions: “Does anyone know of a tool/service that lets you visualize a GTFS file on a map without having to convert to other formats?”


📅 Upcoming Events
GTFS-Flex - Working Group Meeting | January 17, 2024 @ 10 am EST


🛠️ Tools update
It supports the latest spec additions, and features a new summary section of the validation report, including tags to see if a feed has GTFS components like Blocks, Frequencies, or Fares v2.


💬 Join the GTFS Community
Share your ideas with the community! Join the official GTFS GitHub repository.
Get updates as soon as they happen, join the GTFS-changes google groups to get information about new pull requests and votes.
Talk everything Realtime and stay up to date. This group is discussing the GTFS Realtime, asking questions, and proposing changes.
The official GTFS documentation website. Here you will find frequently updated resources for your GTFS needs.
Have a question about GTFS or need to connect with the community? Join in on GTFS slack conversations. This is a great place to have questions answered quickly by the over 1,300 mobility enthusiasts navigating our channels.
 


Thank you for reading the first GTFS Digest! We look forward to bringing you the latest GTFS updates in 2024 and beyond.

Warm wishes for a festive season and a successful new year. Happy holidays from MobilityData! 🎄

GTFS Digest

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Jan 9, 2024, 11:37:30 AM1/9/24
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LINK EDIT

We have 2 upcoming events. The links posted in the December 2023 - GTFS Digest have been changed, here are the new links.

📅 Upcoming Events
GTFS-Flex - Working Group Meeting | January 17, 2024 @ 10 am EST

Thank you for your understanding and we look forward to seeing you at the events. 

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