For the last blog post in our 3-part series on OpenStreetMap (OSM), we would like to focus on what the future of TfNSW’s Trip Planner might be if we harnessed the power of OSM. Trip Planner has already embraced several recent changes (see post Changes and New Features in the TfNSW Trip Planner, such as offering mix modes of transportation to allow more tailored results.
As outlined in our previous blog post, OpenStreetMap (OSM) is a free, editable map of the whole world that is being put together by contributors. The data from OSM is freely available for visualisation, query, download, and modification under open-content license. It provides a high level of detail and accuracy that can rival other map offerings, which at times can make it fairly complex to use.
OpenStreetMap (OSM) is a collaborative open source project that aims to create a free editable map of the world. Think of Wikipedia but in map form. OSM was created by Steve Coast in the UK in 2004 after being inspired by the success of Wikipedia and the rise of proprietary mapping data and tools across the world. Since it began, OSM has grown to over two million registered users who can collect data for the platform. This crowdsourced data is then made available under the Open Database License.
The Transport for NSW trip planner has been going through some great changes as we continue to embrace the Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) philosophy. The recent updates include additional travel options as well as more seamless multi-modal trip plans to help enable the MaaS ecosystem in NSW.
In what is phase 1 of the project, the TfNSW Trip Planner has been updated to include additional travel options along with desired travel times. These changes will allow customers to make more informed choices when planning their trip. The key changes include:
Uber has integrated public transport options into their app and Sydney is the first city in the Asia Pacific region to get the new functionality! From July 29, Uber app users have been shown public transport options that align with their trip including real-time bus, train, ferry and light rail departure and arrival times. Sydney is the fourth city in the world to get the mass transit option after Denver, Boston and London in what is an exciting collaboration between the ride sharing company and Transport for NSW.
Since January 2016 there has been a Courier Hub operating out of Goulburn Street Car Park. This is a joint project between Transport for NSW (TfNSW) and City of Sydney.
The Open Data and Innovation Team is always seeking to release more data and one of our main objectives is to follow the policy for open data and publish data where possible. However, if you’re still on the hunt for something that you need or researching then you can make a request and we’ll do our best to track down and prioritise the release of the data. You may request data via one of the methods below.
2018 was massive for the Open Data and Innovation Team. We had an incredibly busy year organising innovation challenges and other open data initiatives while keeping our real-time data running and releasing many new datasets and resources. In 2018 we ran five innovation challenges, one hackathon (our very first) and published more than forty-five new datasets. We also endorsed four new apps that were successfully incubated and launched as part of our innovation challenges.
The Trip Planner API has multiple endpoints that offer different capabilities and simplifies a lot of the functions that are popular in public transport apps. This makes developing your application much easier and faster. One of the most popular function requests and questions that we receive is about the departure board. Now, thanks to the Trip Planner API, building your own departure board is relatively easy, providing you are familiar with some PHP and basic HTML and CSS styling.
Average of 1.6 - 1.7 million API calls per week