RESTful API Roadmap

In the current OneBusAway roadmap, we expect that the RESTful Mobile SIRI APIs (currently in use in OBA-NYC) will replace the existing "Real-time APIs" in the onebusaway-api-webapp project, but the "Discovery APIs" for static transit information (generated from a GTFS feed) will remain in use.

Here's a list of what APIs will remain in the core OBA project, and what APIs will be replaced.

• OBA Discovery APIs - a set of APIs used to "discover" the type of service available at an agency. This is static (i.e. not realtime) data such as a list of all bus stops or all bus routes that an agency operates, based on the agency's General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) data. These APIs were first deployed as part of the initial Puget Sound OBA deployment, and are currently used by the above-mentioned open-source mobile OBA apps. These APIs will remain in OBA core project.

  Here's a list of OBA Discovery APIs (but see the REST API documentation for full details):

  • agencies-with-coverage - list all supported agencies along with the center of their coverage area
  • agency - get details for a specific agency
  • plan-trip - plan a trip (BETA - will likely be deprecated in future OBA interfaces. Check out OpenTripPlanner if you're interested in trip planning).
  • route-ids-for-agency - get a list of all route ids for an agency
  • route - get details for a specific route
  • routes-for-agency - get a list of all routes for an agency
  • routes-for-location - search for routes near a location, optionally by route name
  • schedule-for-stop - get the full schedule for a stop on a particular day
  • shape - get details for a specific shape (polyline drawn on a map)
  • stop-ids-for-agency - get a list of all stops for an agency
  • stop - get details for a specific stop
  • stops-for-location - search for stops near a location, optionally by stop code
  • stops-for-route - get the set of stops and paths of travel for a particular route
  • trip-details - get extended details for a specific trip
  • trip - get details for a specific trip

• OBA Real-time APIs - a set of APIs used to retrieve the real-time state of the transit system (e.g., what time is the bus estimated to arrive at my stop?). These APIs were first deployed as part of the initial Puget Sound OBA deployment, and are currently used by the above-mentioned open-source OBA apps. These APIs will eventually be replaced by the Mobile SIRI APIs (see next section).

  Here's a list of OBA Real-time APIs (but see the REST API documentation for full details):

  • arrival-and-departure-for-stop - details about a specific arrival/departure at a stop
  • arrivals-and-departures-for-stop - get current arrivals and departures for a stop
  • cancel-alarm - cancel a registered alarm
  • current-time - retrieve the current system time
  • register-alarm-for-arrival-and-departure-at-stop - register an alarm for an arrival-departure event
  • trip-for-vehicle - get extended trip details for current trip of a specific transit vehicle
  • trips-for-location - get active trips near a location
  • trips-for-route - get active trips for a route

• Mobile SIRI APIs - a set of APIs to retrieve real-time transit data (e.g., what time is the bus estimated to arrive at my stop?) that were ratified as an official "Service Interface for Real Time Information (SIRI)" standard by the CEN European Committee for Standardization. These APIs differ from the standard SIRI specification since the mobile SIRI API is designed to be REST-ful and supports Javascript Object Notation (JSON) encoding as well as XML encoding. These APIs were first deployed as part of the MTA Bus Time deployment, and they will eventually replace the OBA Real-time APIs in the main OBA project.

  Here's a list of Mobile SIRI APIs (but see the MTA documentation for full details):

  • VehicleMonitoring: real-time information about one, many, or all vehicles tracked by the system.
  • StopMonitoring: real-time information about vehicles serving a particular stop.

Check out the OneBusAway REST API documentation for information about the OBA Discovery APIs and OBA Real-time APIs. If you're interested in the mobile SIRI API, check out MTA's Bus Time SIRI API developer site.