Political

Transport for London offers up more data for free

Over the summer we reported the welcome news that Transport for London was making more of its data available for others to reuse:

It’s a smart move because it means the emphasis on working out how to make best use of the data shifts from TfL to the wider commercial sector. That means people can experiment (and fail) in a way that is much harder when politicians, media (and yes, bloggers) are looking over your shoulder waiting to shout “Waste of public money!” if an idea doesn’t pan out. It also means that Transport for London can concentrate on what it is (or should be) good at – running transport services, whilst letting those who are good at developing data services and marrying up different commercial ideas can do what they’re good at.


Now TfL has developed its plans further, as a news release reports:

Transport for London (TfL) today unveiled a redesigned online Developers’ Area containing free travel information for mobile application (apps) producers. The free to use information will enable developers to update existing and produce new apps to give passengers a choice of ways to check the status of their journeys while on the move.

The latest addition is a live Tube travel news feed, known as Trackernet. It shows the location of trains across the London Underground network at any time…

Other information [available] includes:

  • Live traffic disruptions;
  • Realtime road message signs;
  • Barclays Cycle Hire docking station locations;
  • Timetable of planned weekend Tube improvement works;
  • Station locations (for Tube, DLR and London Overground);
  • River Thames pier locations;
  • Findaride (licensed private hire operators);
  • Oyster Ticket Stop locations.

Making the live Tube travel information available is the result of collaboration between TfL and Microsoft, creating the Azure Cloud platform to host the information that will meet the expected demand from thousands of developers…

The Mayor of London’s economic development advisor, Anthony Browne, said: “In the digital age Londoners expect to be able to find out where their Tube train or bus is at the touch of a button and that is why having this live tracker feed is so vital. By improving the way we help web developers and make this information available to them we can also provide a potential money spinner for the Capital’s software development experts.”…

TfL will continue to make all of its realtime travel information available free to passengers from its website and stations.

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