MTC 511 Data and Systems Integrator

Metropolitan Transportation Commission

511 Data/Systems Integrator

www.511.org
The 511 SF Bay system, operated by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), is one of the largest and most sophisticated advanced traveler information systems (ATIS) in the nation. The system encompasses mainly the nine Bay Area counties covering approximately 21,000 miles of local streets and highway. The 511 SF Bay system is one of the most heavily used ATIS systems in the nation. During an average month, the system handles more than 675,000 phone calls and more than two million web-user sessions.
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TransSIGHT’s role in this project was to transition the existing system and develop new features and capabilities.  The new capabilities included modernizing the API infrastructure, integrating new systems, reliability improvements, and social media integration.  From a programmatic perspective, TransSIGHT provided stakeholder management, program oversight, collaborated with transit agencies to collect real-time data for use in travel time predictions, coordinated all testing and release management.  For consumers, TransSIGHT designed and implemented the mobile websites and mobile apps for the Transit Trip Planner and Multimodal Trip Planner features of the 511 system.

TransSIGHT  TransSIGHT also operates and maintains the 511 system on behalf of MTC.

Key Challenges

Coordination and Getting Buy-in from 28+ Regional Stakeholders: This being a regional project, it has over 28+ Regional Stakeholder, the key challenge was to coordinate and getting buy-in from the them on the project roadmap, vision, and its elements. The approach followed to mitigate this challenge was to formulate advisory group that met on a regular basis and also conducting break-out sessions with selected stakeholders. 

Integrating Data from 40+ Sources: Regionally there are multiple scheduling and AVL/CAD systems: Trapeze, Hastus, Clever Devices and Cubic NextBus. A phased approach was followed to meet the regional data vision, initially through standard specification.  Data was extracted and transferred from these systems to a centralized data lake. As a follow-on phase, the agencies were systematically migrated to the GTFS standard: now more than half agencies are providing GTFS-RT feeds.