Service analysis and visualization

GTFSwizard analyzes scheduled service. Results describe the timetable rather than observed vehicle movements or passenger demand. Pay attention to each function’s aggregation method because it defines the observational unit.

Service patterns

A GTFS service_id identifies one service calendar. Several IDs can operate on the same date. GTFSwizard assigns the same service_pattern to dates that have the exact same set of active services. Consequently, one service_id can belong to several patterns when the services operating alongside it change.

get_servicepattern(gtfs)
#> # A tibble: 2 × 3
#>   service_id service_pattern  pattern_frequency
#>   <chr>      <chr>                        <int>
#> 1 4          servicepattern-1               614
#> 2 <NA>       No service                     116

pattern_frequency is the number of dates represented by that exact active service set. The most frequent active pattern is therefore a useful default typical day, but it is not necessarily a weekday and should be interpreted from the feed calendar.

plot_calendar(gtfs, fill = "service_pattern", facet_by_year = TRUE)

Frequency and headway

Frequency counts scheduled departures. Headway measures elapsed minutes between successive service instances in a comparable group. Route-level results retain direction_id when it is available.

head(get_frequency(gtfs, method = "by_route"))
#> # A tibble: 6 × 5
#>   route_id direction_id service_pattern  pattern_frequency daily.frequency
#>   <chr>           <int> <chr>                        <int>           <int>
#> 1 6                   0 servicepattern-1               614              63
#> 2 6                   1 servicepattern-1               614              64
#> 3 7                   0 servicepattern-1               614              15
#> 4 7                   1 servicepattern-1               614              15
#> 5 8                   0 servicepattern-1               614              29
#> 6 8                   1 servicepattern-1               614              29
head(get_headways(gtfs, method = "by_route"))
#> # A tibble: 6 × 6
#>   route_id direction_id service_pattern  pattern_frequency headway_minutes
#>   <chr>           <int> <chr>                        <int>           <dbl>
#> 1 6                   0 servicepattern-1               614            17.0
#> 2 6                   1 servicepattern-1               614            16.8
#> 3 7                   0 servicepattern-1               614            62.1
#> 4 7                   1 servicepattern-1               614            62.1
#> 5 8                   0 servicepattern-1               614            37  
#> 6 8                   1 servicepattern-1               614            37  
#> # ℹ 1 more variable: valid_trips <int>

Common method names use underscores:

by_trip returns one observation per trip;
by_route aggregates by route, direction, and service pattern where applicable;
by_hour aggregates scheduled service by hour;
detailed returns stop-call or interval-level observations.

Check a function’s help page because not every method is meaningful for every indicator.

plot_frequency(gtfs)

plot_headways(gtfs)

Duration, distance, speed, dwell time, and fleet

Duration and distance are schedule and geometry properties. Speed combines them, dwell time is departure minus arrival at a stop call, and fleet counts simultaneously active scheduled trip instances.

head(get_durations(gtfs, method = "by_trip"))
#> # A tibble: 6 × 6
#>   route_id trip_id direction_id duration service_pattern  pattern_frequency
#>   <chr>    <chr>          <int>    <dbl> <chr>                        <int>
#> 1 7        10                 0     2400 servicepattern-1               614
#> 2 6        100                1     2160 servicepattern-1               614
#> 3 6        101                1     2160 servicepattern-1               614
#> 4 6        102                1     2160 servicepattern-1               614
#> 5 6        103                1     2160 servicepattern-1               614
#> 6 6        104                1     2160 servicepattern-1               614
head(get_distances(gtfs, method = "by_trip"))
#> # A tibble: 6 × 6
#>   route_id trip_id direction_id distance service_pattern  pattern_frequency
#>   <chr>    <chr>          <int>    <dbl> <chr>                        <int>
#> 1 7        4                  0   17550. servicepattern-1               614
#> 2 7        5                  0   17550. servicepattern-1               614
#> 3 7        6                  0   17550. servicepattern-1               614
#> 4 7        7                  0   17550. servicepattern-1               614
#> 5 7        8                  0   17550. servicepattern-1               614
#> 6 7        9                  0   17550. servicepattern-1               614
head(get_speeds(gtfs, method = "by_route"))
#> # A tibble: 6 × 6
#>   route_id direction_id trips average.speed service_pattern  pattern_frequency
#>   <chr>           <int> <int>         <dbl> <chr>                        <int>
#> 1 6                   0    63          38.3 servicepattern-1               614
#> 2 6                   1    64          38.3 servicepattern-1               614
#> 3 7                   0    15          26.3 servicepattern-1               614
#> 4 7                   1    15          25.7 servicepattern-1               614
#> 5 8                   0    29          21.9 servicepattern-1               614
#> 6 8                   1    29          21.9 servicepattern-1               614
head(get_dwelltimes(gtfs, method = "by_route"))
#> # A tibble: 6 × 6
#>   route_id direction_id trips average.dwelltime service_pattern 
#>   <chr>           <int> <int>             <dbl> <chr>           
#> 1 6                   0  1260                 0 servicepattern-1
#> 2 6                   1  1280                 0 servicepattern-1
#> 3 7                   0   150                 0 servicepattern-1
#> 4 7                   1   150                 0 servicepattern-1
#> 5 8                   0   290                 0 servicepattern-1
#> 6 8                   1   290                 0 servicepattern-1
#> # ℹ 1 more variable: pattern_frequency <int>
get_fleet(gtfs, method = "peak")
#> # A tibble: 3 × 4
#>   service_pattern  pattern_frequency  hour fleet
#>   <chr>                        <int> <dbl> <int>
#> 1 servicepattern-1               614    18    10
#> 2 servicepattern-1               614     6     9
#> 3 servicepattern-1               614     7     9

These are scheduled indicators. They do not estimate congestion, reliability, vehicle availability, layover policy, deadheading, or passenger loads unless those effects are already represented in the feed.

Spatial structure

The spatial helpers return standard sf objects. Inferred shapes and corridor segments connect coordinates with straight lines; they are not map-matched paths.

stops <- get_stops_sf(gtfs$stops)
shapes <- get_shapes_sf(gtfs$shapes)
nrow(stops)
#> [1] 39
nrow(shapes)
#> [1] 6

Hubs summarize stops by their scheduled trip and route connections. Corridors join frequently served consecutive stop pairs and report length in meters.

head(get_hubs(gtfs))
#> Simple feature collection with 6 features and 5 fields
#> Geometry type: POINT
#> Dimension:     XY
#> Bounding box:  xmin: -38.62687 ymin: -3.895013 xmax: -38.56387 ymax: -3.775791
#> Geodetic CRS:  WGS 84
#> # A tibble: 6 × 6
#>   stop_id trip_id     route_id  n_trip n_routes              geometry
#>   <chr>   <list>      <list>     <int>    <int>           <POINT [°]>
#> 1 28      <chr [185]> <chr [2]>    185        2 (-38.56387 -3.775791)
#> 2 27      <chr [127]> <chr [1]>    127        1 (-38.62042 -3.895013)
#> 3 26      <chr [127]> <chr [1]>    127        1  (-38.62687 -3.88752)
#> 4 25      <chr [127]> <chr [1]>    127        1 (-38.62556 -3.877935)
#> 5 24      <chr [127]> <chr [1]>    127        1 (-38.62003 -3.867487)
#> 6 23      <chr [127]> <chr [1]>    127        1 (-38.60866 -3.851034)
get_corridor(gtfs, i = 0.2, min_length = 100)
#> Simple feature collection with 1 feature and 4 fields
#> Geometry type: MULTILINESTRING
#> Dimension:     XY
#> Bounding box:  xmin: -38.62687 ymin: -3.895013 xmax: -38.53248 ymax: -3.720076
#> Geodetic CRS:  WGS 84
#> # A tibble: 1 × 5
#>   corridor   stop_id    trip_id     length                              geometry
#> * <chr>      <list>     <list>       <dbl>                 <MULTILINESTRING [°]>
#> 1 Corridor 1 <chr [20]> <chr [127]> 22953. ((-38.53248 -3.72603, -38.5349 -3.73…

Use plot_hubs() and plot_corridor() for the corresponding network views. The i argument is a share threshold, not an absolute number of trips.

Choosing a plot

plot_calendar() shows active dates, trip counts, or service patterns.
plot_frequency() and plot_headways() show system service by hour.
plot_routefrequency() compares routes with a readable top_n limit.
plot_servicespan() shows first departure and final arrival.
plot_serviceheatmap() compares scheduled departures by weekday and hour.
plot_routeduration() compares trip-duration distributions.
plot_servicesupply() compares scheduled vehicle-hours.

All plotting functions return ggplot objects, so labels and themes can be extended with ggplot2 when needed.