Drive:Activated : public transport, victoria

Metlink is going mobile!

Sam — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 07:19:00 GMT

UPDATE (31/12/2008): It seems like Metlink has broken this trick, so this won't work anymore. There is however, a neat site out there called iTransit that does something similar. It does favour the iPhone, but that's the only option I can think of at the moment.

I never thought this day would come, and it still isn't really here yet, but it's a promising start. I stumbled on to it while trying out their new 'beta' timetables (which are horribly broken in Firefox 3), so I assume it will be improved and officially announced soon.

It works a lot better than trying to use their main 'for desktops' website on a phone, even on the iPhone. Rather than giving you the full timetable, it gives you the next 8 or so departures from that stop. That's generally all you want to know when you're out and about (although it means you can't plan ahead, e.g. work out when the last train is until it is too late). You can even choose to get the departure time, or in 'countdown' form, i.e. departing in 5 minutes.

It is basically similar to the SMS services available from Yarra Trams and Connex Melbourne. Those existing services are in fact much more powerful than Metlink mobile. However, there is no such service on any of the bus lines, so it is new for them.

Accessing Metlink timetable information on your mobile

Open up your mobile's web browser. Of course, make sure you are connected to the internet blah blah.
Navigate to - http://tt.metlinkmelbourne.com.au
Here's where it gets tricky. It obviously is a prototype at the moment, so it asks you for the 'Stop ID'. See below for instructions on how to find out the Stop ID of your stop. For now, let's try a bus stop (9663 - Chadstone/Warrigal Rd/Holmesglen TAFE), a tram stop (18194 - Southern Cross/Spencer St), and a train station (19854 - Flinders St Station). Enter one of those Stop IDs into the Stop ID box.
Select whether you want 'Monitor' or 'Countdown'. 'Monitor' means that it returns the time of the next few services departing from that stop. 'Countdown' means it returns the number of minutes until the service departs from that stop. The examples below will explain the difference.
Click Submit.

And that's it! There's not much more information available yet (e.g. no platform numbers for trains); although I presume they're working on it. Here are some sample results from the service (the tram example is using the countdown mode; all others are in monitor mode):

Discovering the Stop ID of your stop

Direct method - use this method if you know the name of your stop (generally its location)

On your computer, open your browser and navigate to http://www.metlinkmelbourne.com.au/maps_stations_stops/station_stop_information
Select which mode of transport you want to get on at that stop. Note - if that stop services more than one mode of transport (e.g. Flinders St Station has both trams and trains), it will have multiple Stop IDs, one for each mode of transport.
Using the dropdown boxes in the 'Stop Search' section, find your stop.
Now under the new 'Stop Profiles' section, you should see your stop. Click on the link.
Now either,

look at the URL of the current page - the Stop ID is the number at the end of the URL, e.g.
or, look at the new 'Services from this Station' section (this is part of the new Beta timetable project) - the Stop ID is displayed at the top-right of that box, e.g.

Via the route method - use this method if you don't know the name of your stop, but know the route that services it.

Find the timetable page for the route that services the desired stop, e.g. http://www.metlinkmelbourne.com.au/index.php/route/view/956. The beta timetable pages work fine as well.
Click on the desired stop to go to the Stop Profile.
Follow step 5 in the direct method above.

For the lazy people, here are the Stop IDs for City Loop train stations:

Southern Cross (Spencer St was a much better name) - 22180
Flagstaff - 19841
Melbourne Central - 19842
Parliament - 19843
Flinders St - 19854

Where to from here?

At least Metlink is finally listening to their frequent customers and fixing their website and mobile access. The Metlink website is great for occasional use, but absolutely sucks for frequent travellers (I think I can subconsciously type in my stops into Journey Planner now that I've done it so many times). So among other things, can we have RSS feeds soon, please? Timetables and service updates are perfect candidates for feeds.Your view engine seems to be based on XML and XSLT anyway, so it won't be that hard to apply an XSLT to produce RSS.

Oh, and the URLs for the new beta timetables are ridiculous. There has to be a better way of doing things. And My Way seems to be dead, not that it was ever very useful anyway. And please fix journey planner too - it sometimes produces incorrect times.

And I hope you intend to have platform numbers, stop information, journey planner and service updates on the mobile as well.

I could go on, but I think that's enough for now

Breaking timetables free from Metlink's prison

Sam — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:31:31 GMT

Between watching the two grand finals this weekend (boring matches, but awesome results for Victoria ), I managed to get some time to start poking around with Python, a programming language. And what better way to learn something than using it to tackle a pet peeve. So I wrote a python script that extracts timetable data from the Metlink website, and into an XML format. The reason? So I can get Metlink timetables on my phone, so I don't get to the station just as a train's leaving, because crappy Metlink doesn't offer mobile-friendly access to their timetables, or downloadable versions. More on Metlink's web annoyances and improvements here.

Python's definitely growing on me - I can see how it can be more productive. The interactive console is great, but I still have to work out a better way to debug my programs. I was surprised that it didn't have inbuilt support for XPath though - it's a pretty common inclusion now. Luckily there are a few modules out there that can do this - the best one in my opinion being lxml, which I used. I can see a place for it in my toolbox, especially for putting together some quick scripts.

Anyway, here's the link to the project page with all the details on it - http://driveactivated.com/projects/pages/metlink-timetable-downloader.aspx.

Like I said on that page, I'm hoping that with access to the timetable data, people can start doing some stuff with it, some kind of mash-up. I'm personally going to rig up a nicer and friendlier desktop and mobile app when I get time, because I think it could really do with one. Maybe later I'll write a script to get the service updates information, and interface with the search and journey planner tool too. Better not do it too soon though, don't want to make it too easy for people to use public transport because it's already overloading now .

Anyone got some cool ideas with what to do with the Metlink data?

myki waiting to be discovered

Sam — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 09:21:00 GMT

Opened without much fanfare (well, nothing I saw on mainstream media/blogs), the myki discovery centre has opened at Southern Cross station. Even the press release was hidden in the 'latest news' section of the myki website; nothing was changed on the front page to tell people, but I digress.

What's myki? It's the new smartcard ticket system for Victoria's public transport, to be introduced in around the third quarter this year.

The discovery centre's located outside the paid area of Southern Cross, near the bunch of shops facing Spencer St. (Interestingly, Southern Cross seems to be Microsoft's preferred advertising spot, with Vista 'Wow' signage everywhere, as well as a bunch of guys demoing the new Games for Windows initiative on the big screen just as you go down the stairs from the paid area.)

So what did I learn? Nothing really that I didn't know about, but I did find out more details.

To start off with, all the metcard machines will be dumped, for new machines with a touchscreen interface. This allows users to buy disposable smartcards, set to what ever ticket type they choose. From what I saw, the terminology was still zone 1 or zone 2. It could've been a lot better if they asked for people's planned destinations for the day, and select the zones needed accordingly. Disposable smartcards seem a bit wasteful too, and the fact that they're plastic means they'll be worse for the environment. A good thing though, is that all machines will now accept notes too (including ones on trams), so no need to keep a heavy bag of coins just for trips.

But for most users, we won't be buying tickets every time we take a trip. Why? Because starting with students, and later all commuters, we'll be buying a myki smartcard, estimated to be a few bucks for the card registration (or less for anonymous ones I think - pricing TBA), plus a starting amount of credit. Buying a myki means everytime you need to use public transport - buses, trains & trams - you just 'scan on', that is, swipe your smartcard over the sensor area (it can be in your wallet), then 'scan off' when you leave. The cheapest fare will automatically be deducted, and the scanning machine will beep when your credit is low, or when its out of credit. It shows you the amount of credit left, as well as the current ticket you're travelling on too. Blue enquiry machines located throughout the network lets you view more history details too.

It is actually quite smart when calculating 'the smartest fare'. Many systems overseas just charge you per trip, because its much easier to calculate, but Melbourne will retain its time-based structure.

So, assuming the current Metcard full fares (which will have increased by the time myki is introduced), let's say you take the bus from Vermont South to Glen Waverley - it will deduct 2.40 from your card for a 2-hour zone-2 full fare ticket.

You then take the train from Glen Waverley to Flinders St - noticing you've travelled into a zone-1 area, it will deduct the additional difference to turn your ticket into a 2-hour zone-1+2 full fare ticket, that is, deduct 5.20 (zone 1+2) - 2.40 (zone 2) = 2.80.
Now, let's say you spend the day in the city meeting friends and shopping. When you travel back to Glen Waverley on the train, it'll noticed that you bought a zone-1+2 2-hour ticket, realise its the same day, and convert that into a daily zone-1+2 ticket, deducting the difference, 9.70 (daily) - 5.20 (2-hour) = 4.50.
Nothing further will be deducted when you take the bus from Glen Waverley to Vermont South - your current ticket already covers this.
Now let's say you end up doing similar trips for the rest of the week, Tuesday to Sunday. It'll charge you 7 zone 1+2 daily full fare tickets right? Wrong. Once you've bought enough zone 1+2 daily full fare tickets to exceed the price of a weekly zone 1+2 ticket (45.20, so a bit over 4 daily tickets), it'll automatically convert your past tickets into a weekly ticket, allowing you to travel for the rest of the weekly period for nothing (so trips after Friday will be free). The same occurs for monthly.

It's a pretty cool system, and takes the guesswork needed to plan trips to save money. Because of this though, it is imperative that commuters 'scan off' before they leave the vehicle, otherwise the computer will have no way of working out where you left and will end up charging you full price for the trip. This applies to buses and trams, so it'll be interesting how well it is done, given there's enough of a problem with lack of validation on trams. People just aren't used to scanning off on these vehicles (arguably on trains either, given the open gates all the time). Overseas systems tend to just charge you the full fare, which while easier for commuters, means they get charged more.

If you get a registered myki, that is, one with your photo and details on it (which all concession travellers will have), you get to check your myki details online, as well as top it up over the net with a credit card. Credit can also be transferred if you lose your card. Alternatively, credit can also be topped up at service centres, the new machines mentioned earlier, or direct debited.

Later on, they'll be introducing facilities that let you use it at newsagencies, coffee shops, 7-11s, and more, which means less need to carry coinage!

Melbourne is really playing catch-up to the rest of the world with this system, but hopefully with the expertise gathered from installations around the world, our one will work smoothly from the get-go (unlikely with big projects, but hey, wishful thinking's good ). It's definitely easier than the current system, so once we get over the initial learning curve, I think there'll be more people willing to give it a try. It hides a lot of the zonal pricing system, so there should be less confusion.

The discovery centre at Southern Cross is quite good, with all the bits we'll be using operational, plus the staff there seem pretty knowledgeable, answering nearly all the questions I bombarded her with. Check it out, or at least check out the myki website (very nice design too) - most of us will be using it sometime in the future, so might as well get used to it.

P.S. Sorry guys for the lack of pictures - I thought I could find them on the myki site which would look better than the crappy ones from my phone's camera, but there weren't any there. The picture above, from the myki site, is of the scan-on-scan-off machine. The balance-checking machine looks very similar, except has a row of 4 silver buttons and is the whole thing is coloured blue/purple. The gates don't look much different, except they have a bigger screen and also a smartcard scanner on the top. The ticketing machines were a bit devoid of signage at the moment (just plain silver), but its just a big silver box with notes and coin slots, smartcard reader, and a 13-inch touchscreen. The bigger one has EFTPOS facilities as well.