ServiceAlerts and in unavailability of Pathways (and facilities) in GTFS-RT

[Stefan de Konink]

With pathways in GTFS the question has popped up if we could influence
routing decisions on pathways and alert travelers that an elevator is out
of order (and a mobility impaired person must take a detour). Or inform
people about slippery stairs or general maintenance around a station.

What are the general thoughts concerning a "tripupdate" for pathways and
service alerts for paths and nodes?

--
Stefan

[Leo Frachet]

Hi Stefan,

Yes, this was the initial goal, and this is why we have a pathway_id field in pathways.txt, which is required but currently unused.

In the full GTFS-Pathways proposal document (bit.ly/gtfs-pathways), the last section is called « GTFS-PathwayUpdates » and is one proposal for a real-time feed describing:

- closure of pathways

- pathway « stopped » (an escalator stopped can still be used as a stair, when an escalator closed forces to find another way)

- pathway « operating with limitation » which has to be linked to an alert, e.g. if the platform is covered with ice, or if the light are broken.

- pathways which are reversed, for example escalator which are exceptionally put all in the same direction to evacuate a station. 

It’s available here:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qJOTe4m_a4dcJnvXYt4smYj4QQ1ejZ8CvLBYzDM5IyM/edit#heading=h.ikb23zeppj2n

Don’t hesitate to provide feedback, and if you know a potential producer, let us know.

Best,

Leo

—

Leo Frachet | fr, en, de | Executive Director of MobilityData IO | MobilityData.io

l...@MobilityData.org | CA & US: +1 514 222 7204 | FR & EU : ‭+33 7 69 87 85 13‬

Montréal, Québec, Canada

[Nikhil VJ]

Hi,

A small input : I think it would be good to create a new feed/component for this like "StationUpdate.pb" rather than adding this to "TripUpdate.pb". Please ignore this email if that is already the case.

Why: 

1. TripUpdate.pb is already quite heavy and complicated compared to, say, VehiclePosition.pb . Increasing size/complexity further will get costlier for all stakeholders, and the feed production process may get slower too resulting in delayed updates.

2. Consumers of trip updates may not necessarily want all the station updates, and consumers of station updates may not necessarily want all the trip updates.

3. Update frequency of station updates may be very different than that of trip updates.

4. Different entities/departments in the transport agency may be looking after upkeep of stops/stations (some cases it may be outsourced); it may be better to let them independently generate station updates.

Regards

Nikhil VJ, Pune, India

https://nikhilvj.co.in

[Stefan de Konink]

On donderdag 26 september 2019 18:35:43 CEST, Leo Frachet wrote:
> Don’t hesitate to provide feedback, and if you know a potential
> producer, let us know.

We would be willing to provide realtime elevator information. In a GTFS-RT
formation, is there already a protobuf definition file available?

--
Stefan

[Leo Frachet]

Nikhil: The specification is currently silent on whether to group the .pb or to split them. So up to you.

Stefan: Not yet. I’ll ask Sean (Barbeau) to write one, he knows better than I do for protobuf related subjects. Do you have any feedback on the current proposal, or does it look good for you?

Thanks,

Leo

—

Leo Frachet | fr, en, de | Executive Director of MobilityData IO | MobilityData.org

l...@MobilityData.org | +1 514 222 7204 | Montréal, Québec, Canada

[Stefan de Konink]

On vrijdag 4 oktober 2019 20:05:39 CEST, Leo Frachet wrote:
> Stefan: Not yet. I’ll ask Sean (Barbeau) to write one, he knows
> better than I do for protobuf related subjects. Do you have any
> feedback on the current proposal, or does it look good for you?

Lets see if we can implement it, and then discuss further concerning
changes. I think we still lack a proper editor (GUI) for these kind of
things. If anyone wants to collaborate on an open source tool that could
facilitate network management, that would be great. I am currently working
on things like stops, grouping and aggregation visualisation.

--
Stefan

[Sean Barbeau]

Stefan and all,

Here's a PR that contains an updated gtfs-realtime.proto file to support StationUpdates as defined in the Google Doc:

https://github.com/MobilityData/transit/pull/42

Please give it a try and let us know how it works!

Sean

[Sean Barbeau]

Stefan (and all),

I just wanted to loop back on this - have you had a chance to work on implementing StationUpdates?

There was a comment on the pull request (https://github.com/MobilityData/transit/pull/42) asking if anyone has implemented this.

Sean