Your model should be:
— the OKCupid blog posts: http://blog.okcupid.com/
— 538.com http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/
People love to read these, they don’t treat me like I’m stupid, they are as technical as necessary even though they’re written for laypeople, and they’re chock full of interesting observations that I wouldn’t have thought of. If you can produce vidualizations that allow us to see trends in ways we have never even conceived before, then make conclusions in the form of recommendations, that could really influence policy.
This is an amazing idea. I want to know on average how late a bus is at a particular stop. I also want to know when a bus will be too full for me to get on. I also think it’d be cool to understand the speed that traffic moves at throughout the city at different times of day. Maybe you could infer this from the movement of the busses?
I have total faith that you can do this. But you have to make this easily readable/accessable to be of any use. Your first project with this was good, but difficult to use for someone who was unfamiliar with the interface.
Lateness definitely. Which lines are most reliable, how late are they usually? Also which stops are typically skipped if the bus is full. For example, if you get on the 28x anywhere but the first 3 stops i usually completely bypasses you.
Be careful that you don’t fudge your data just to influence policy. You have to be careful about what is art and what is science.
I think data on the relative crowdness is interesting. What busses are empty when others are full and is their opportunity to move them around to be more efficent.
I heard that routes are based on manual surveys done at specific times. It would be much better if bus routes were made from the more exact and year-round data that you have.
You could also show the parts of routes that are most busy. For example, many routes are busy for a small streth and it makes sense to have the busses go back and fourh on this small section. It would make sense for most of the 61s to turn around at Murray and go back downtown.
But, will it bring the 500 back? but does it blend?
Bus times are always unpredictable, is there a way to estimate how late a bus will be for a given time?
—-What buses/drivers/lines are the most often on-time
++How does rush-hour traffic effect bus times? Is it predictable to know that between 8-10am and 4-6pm I can show up to the stop Xminutes late?
There are no timetbales I can find. How about a time app, etc to know when busses are coming. None of the bus stops have timetables so you’re screwed if you don’t have a smart phone and Google Maps.
I can’t stand that I can’t tell what busses are going were by looking at them. if they could be color coded or something so that I could know “ok that a pink bus, pink busses always go by my house” that would be great.
^agreed!
I would also like a counter on the bus stop letting you know how long untill the bus arrives. I hate just standing there and you don’t know how long you should wait before you start calling in favors from your friend with a car.
I also want an electonic map showing were on the route you are. and how many stops there are to go. They have some awesom stuff like that on the busses in london.
I hate the buses can be late. I don’t like broken seats… I don’t mind having to look up which bus to take and when, but having to wait in bad weather is really annoying.
Most compelling to me is to know how late (or early) the bus is on average at each stop, maybe in relation to time of day. That could actually influence my future actions: maybe I get to a stop earlier if I know that it always arrives before the scheduled time.
I would like to know the liklihood of my bus showing up on time, 5 min late or 10+ min late at any given part of the day. I’s always a gamble whether I should go wait for the bus, or if it’s faster to walk. If I had statistics to reference to make an educated guess, it would help immensely. AND if it could even make a If there’s a way to create a public resource to get this form a mobile phone… i want it.
I would like to know if my bus will be coming in on time because it’s never on time. I wanna know how on time late they are on a given day. (the average)
The likelihood of the bus being late or early might be useful or interesting. I hate waiting 20 minutes for the bus to find out that it came early by a minute or two.
It could also be itneresting to try and see patterns of activity within the city depending when people get on and off the bus. Trace when and where people are moving around the city. (not sure if you have this data or not though)
The routes dont seem to be set up idealy. If you could take a really hard look at the way the busses are used, a show better routes ect…
Yeah, routing would be interesting to look at, you mentioned once the idea of “growing” bus lines, which might be an interesting way of approaching the problem.
Do a race between buses and a walking person. <[Reminds me of Thoreau's passage in Walden where he talks about trains and a race between someone taking a train and someone walking] Sometimes it is more efficient for me to walk than to wait for the bus because when the buses get full they just pass you by and you end up waiting for like half an hour. It would be really useful to know when the rush hour times are for buses, and when buses come really often and efficiently (for me this is around 4:30pm).
Here's a hate too: when the 61's all come at the same time every 20 minutes in a little train of buses instead of spreading out so that there's one coming every 5 minutes.
Historical trends of which bus is more on time?
My biggest pressure points are the following: knowing what times are so crowded that I may not get a seat (830 AM is pretty bad), when is the latest bus and sometimes it comes early, generally knowing if busses are coming early or late.
I htink you have a very interesting concept that you have been building on. I only worry that you becuase I dont want another data set telling me the current system sucks....I wonder what implementation you can use with your findings that is both useful and a creative commentary on the current data (google / transit authority) collectors and the actual bus movement....some interesting things to think about may be UPS logisitcs...they only take right turns and have a ton of peculiar rules.
Not knowing when the bus will show up.
+100 This. I hate being stranded.
Not knowing the bus route.
Biggest current flaw in bus system: why have a bus schedule when they all show up at arbitrary times anyway?
Hate? It never arrives on damn time, and never at the same times.
Here are todays comments:
Your model should be:
— the OKCupid blog posts: http://blog.okcupid.com/
— 538.com http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/
People love to read these, they don’t treat me like I’m stupid, they are as technical as necessary even though they’re written for laypeople, and they’re chock full of interesting observations that I wouldn’t have thought of. If you can produce vidualizations that allow us to see trends in ways we have never even conceived before, then make conclusions in the form of recommendations, that could really influence policy.
This is an amazing idea. I want to know on average how late a bus is at a particular stop. I also want to know when a bus will be too full for me to get on. I also think it’d be cool to understand the speed that traffic moves at throughout the city at different times of day. Maybe you could infer this from the movement of the busses?
I have total faith that you can do this. But you have to make this easily readable/accessable to be of any use. Your first project with this was good, but difficult to use for someone who was unfamiliar with the interface.
Lateness definitely. Which lines are most reliable, how late are they usually? Also which stops are typically skipped if the bus is full. For example, if you get on the 28x anywhere but the first 3 stops i usually completely bypasses you.
Be careful that you don’t fudge your data just to influence policy. You have to be careful about what is art and what is science.
I think data on the relative crowdness is interesting. What busses are empty when others are full and is their opportunity to move them around to be more efficent.
I heard that routes are based on manual surveys done at specific times. It would be much better if bus routes were made from the more exact and year-round data that you have.
You could also show the parts of routes that are most busy. For example, many routes are busy for a small streth and it makes sense to have the busses go back and fourh on this small section. It would make sense for most of the 61s to turn around at Murray and go back downtown.
But, will it bring the 500 back? but does it blend?
Bus times are always unpredictable, is there a way to estimate how late a bus will be for a given time?
—-What buses/drivers/lines are the most often on-time
++How does rush-hour traffic effect bus times? Is it predictable to know that between 8-10am and 4-6pm I can show up to the stop Xminutes late?
There are no timetbales I can find. How about a time app, etc to know when busses are coming. None of the bus stops have timetables so you’re screwed if you don’t have a smart phone and Google Maps.
I can’t stand that I can’t tell what busses are going were by looking at them. if they could be color coded or something so that I could know “ok that a pink bus, pink busses always go by my house” that would be great.
^agreed!
I would also like a counter on the bus stop letting you know how long untill the bus arrives. I hate just standing there and you don’t know how long you should wait before you start calling in favors from your friend with a car.
I also want an electonic map showing were on the route you are. and how many stops there are to go. They have some awesom stuff like that on the busses in london.
I hate the buses can be late. I don’t like broken seats… I don’t mind having to look up which bus to take and when, but having to wait in bad weather is really annoying.
Most compelling to me is to know how late (or early) the bus is on average at each stop, maybe in relation to time of day. That could actually influence my future actions: maybe I get to a stop earlier if I know that it always arrives before the scheduled time.
I would like to know the liklihood of my bus showing up on time, 5 min late or 10+ min late at any given part of the day. I’s always a gamble whether I should go wait for the bus, or if it’s faster to walk. If I had statistics to reference to make an educated guess, it would help immensely. AND if it could even make a If there’s a way to create a public resource to get this form a mobile phone… i want it.
I would like to know if my bus will be coming in on time because it’s never on time. I wanna know how on time late they are on a given day. (the average)
The likelihood of the bus being late or early might be useful or interesting. I hate waiting 20 minutes for the bus to find out that it came early by a minute or two.
It could also be itneresting to try and see patterns of activity within the city depending when people get on and off the bus. Trace when and where people are moving around the city. (not sure if you have this data or not though)
The routes dont seem to be set up idealy. If you could take a really hard look at the way the busses are used, a show better routes ect…
Yeah, routing would be interesting to look at, you mentioned once the idea of “growing” bus lines, which might be an interesting way of approaching the problem.
Do a race between buses and a walking person. <[Reminds me of Thoreau's passage in Walden where he talks about trains and a race between someone taking a train and someone walking] Sometimes it is more efficient for me to walk than to wait for the bus because when the buses get full they just pass you by and you end up waiting for like half an hour. It would be really useful to know when the rush hour times are for buses, and when buses come really often and efficiently (for me this is around 4:30pm). Here's a hate too: when the 61's all come at the same time every 20 minutes in a little train of buses instead of spreading out so that there's one coming every 5 minutes. Historical trends of which bus is more on time? My biggest pressure points are the following: knowing what times are so crowded that I may not get a seat (830 AM is pretty bad), when is the latest bus and sometimes it comes early, generally knowing if busses are coming early or late. I htink you have a very interesting concept that you have been building on. I only worry that you becuase I dont want another data set telling me the current system sucks....I wonder what implementation you can use with your findings that is both useful and a creative commentary on the current data (google / transit authority) collectors and the actual bus movement....some interesting things to think about may be UPS logisitcs...they only take right turns and have a ton of peculiar rules. Not knowing when the bus will show up. +100 This. I hate being stranded. Not knowing the bus route. Biggest current flaw in bus system: why have a bus schedule when they all show up at arbitrary times anyway? Hate? It never arrives on damn time, and never at the same times.