Traffic flow measurement of a public transport system through automated Web observation

Abstract

When it comes down to public transport systems, delays are a hot topic. For a quantitative conclusion whether a delay is just an incident or happens on a regular basis, we have to believe in the figures published in the annual reports of public transport companies. However, even if some data is available online, it is quite hard to independently examine these numbers without information technologies. This paper presents an architecture for extracting Web data from a local transport operator through automated Web observations. By exploiting an already existing Web infrastructure, we are not only able to collect vast amounts of transportation data but may also visualise all transportation units (bus or trams) interactively. Moreover, collecting Web data enables us to make suggestions in order to reassess the performance figures of the annual report in terms of accuracy and precision. Monitoring key values help identifying the state of the transportation system.