The above extract uses the Route relation tags in OpenStreetMap. By logging on it is possible to edit the map to add bus routes to the road links they run on.
The Traveline response to the Consultation on Government's proposal to open up Ordnance Survey's data.
On 31 March 2010 Communities and Local Government published the then Government's response to its consultation on policy options for geographic information from Ordnance Survey.
In its response, CLG set out its intention to move to a commercial relationship with Ordnance Survey to provide mapping products and services to Government, and, subject to discussions, the entire public sector, under a centrally-funded Public Sector Mapping Agreement (PSMA).
CLG now confirms that a PSMA for provision of Ordnance Survey GI data to all of the public sector in England and Wales will come into effect from 1 April 2011. CLG has published a Transition Plan, setting out the scope of the PSMA and plans to implement the agreement by 1 April 2011. The Transition Plan can be viewed at: http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/corporate/transitionplanaug2010
Q. “I am asking you to make a statement to ITO (or to the regions) on behalf of the OS to say that the OS are content with the local authorities using ITN data to derive intermediate running times for public transport services between timing points and that the resulting data is not in any way restricted by OS licensing.”Answer (6 April 2010) from James Brayshaw Director of Ordnance Survey:
A. We can confirm that Local Authorities may use ITN data, licensed under Collective Purchasing Agreement, to create public transport timetables represented in numerical format. Local Authorities may retain such timetables on expiry of the ITN licence. Furthermore the local authorities may supply the numerical timetables to third parties, such as ITO for onward publishing, without being restricted by OS licensing. I hope this clarifies.
"I can assure the OSM community that the Department for Transport has been assured by Ordnance Survey that they do not claim any rights over NaPTAN location data - and it is a matter of record that Department for Transport is the owner of the NPTG database. Both NaPTAN and NPTG are maintained by DfT as national databases, collating data from all local transport authorities in England, Wales and Scotland." - Roger Slevin DfT March 2009
"It was established that if a Local Authority was displaying its own data with no route or other Ordnance Survey data, for example bus stops, on Ordnance Survey mapping for its own area then it did not need a commercial agreement and could provide that functionality under the MSA provided that the mapping carried a Local Authority watermark." - notes of meeting between National Traveline and Ordnance Survey on 26 May 2006.
the reason the OS were happy to refer to the bus stop data as "the local authority's own data" was because it has been collected using GPS devices. It is important that the location of bus stops continues to be collected without reference to OS maps.
"OS are interested in the use of data that is derived from maps ie if a map has been used to create timetable data. They have route planning fees and this can potentially hit journey planners if OS can claim a stake in the data." - advice from a Local Authority map licencing officer.
OS notes on publishing OS derived data with other maps as a backdrop (OS password is needed)
We may have seen maps in the journey planner as a nice-to-have feature that you either do or do not have. The workshops focused on the user needs for mapping at different stages of the enquiry and stages in travel. It may be possible to switch on and off different levels of detail to respond to the user need, for instance the landmarks that you need on a map when you are on a bus and want to know when to get off, are very different from the map needed to walk from the bus stop to your final destination. We considered the role of maps in verifying the journey solution, helping the user to build up a mental map of the journey and options available, and visualising the impact of disruption or special events. The future direction of mapping is to respond to personalisation of the enquiry service and deliver maps to mobile devices.
Cartographers from the University of Glasgow presented their work and referred to studies of maps for public transport that are soon to appear in the online journalofmaps
Ordnance Survey attended. Several attending encouraged traveline to negotiate the sale of its walk links information. The walks that contribute most to the improvement of journey planning could be made part of the map datasets, ahead of the national surveying of them by OS. These might for instance include walks that link rail station entrances to the highway network.
This diagram is created entirely from public transport data. The route from Nedderton to Blyth Bus station was found in a Traveline journey planner. The journey solution involved a change at Red Lion, Glebe Road.
The journey planner gave a listing of all the intermediate stop points. The coordinates of these points provide the route but it would be a jagged line. Therefore the bearing of the stop is obtained from NaPTAN and it used to create a Bezier curve through the StopPoint which more accurately repesents the curves of the road.
The Stop Point names are the Common Names of the timing points along route.
The locality names are applied as the open circles, centred on the coordinates of the locality.
Here are the GPX files for a bus route created as an ordered list of the bus stops the route calls at:
The routes can be seen as a diagram in OpenStreetMap and the GPX file downloaded:
The routes can be seen in Everytrail overlaid on Googlemaps:
Note how the route is related to the bus stop.
The routes can be seen in GoogleEarth:
Here is a spreadsheet showing how the GPS file was created from the timetable and associated data.
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© Traveline 2010, Last updated: 5 August 2010