Bus Route and Stop Methods

Bus stop information, route and schedule data, and bus positions.

XML - Bus Position

Description

Returns bus positions for the given route, with an optional search radius. If no parameters are specified, all bus positions are returned.

Note that the RouteID parameter accepts only base route names and no variations, i.e.: use 10A instead of 10Av1 or 10Av2.

Bus positions are refreshed approximately every 20 to 30 7 to 10 seconds.

Response Elements

Element Description
BusPositions Array containing bus position information (BusPositions).
BusPosition Elements
DateTime Date and time (Eastern Standard Time) of last position update. Will be in YYYY-MM-DDTHH:mm:ss format (e.g.: 2014-10-27T13:23:40).
Deviation Deviation, in minutes, from schedule. Positive values indicate that the bus is running late while negative ones are for buses running ahead of schedule.
DirectionNum Deprecated. Use the DirectionText for a customer-friendly description of direction.
DirectionText General direction of the trip, not the bus itself (e.g.: NORTH, SOUTH, EAST, WEST).
Lat Last reported Latitude of the bus.
Lon Last reported Longitude of the bus.
RouteID Base route name as shown on the bus. Note that the base route name could also refer to any variant, so a RouteID of 10A could refer to 10A, 10Av1, 10Av2, etc.
TripEndTime Scheduled end date and time (Eastern Standard Time) of the bus's current trip. Will be in YYYY-MM-DDTHH:mm:ss format (e.g.: 2014-10-27T13:17:00).
TripHeadsign Destination of the bus.
TripID Unique trip ID. This can be correlated with the data returned from the schedule-related methods.
TripStartTime Scheduled start date and time (Eastern Standard Time) of the bus's current trip. Will be in YYYY-MM-DDTHH:mm:ss format (e.g.: 2014-10-27T12:40:00).
VehicleID Unique identifier for the bus. This is usually visible on the bus itself.

Try it

Request URL

Request parameters

(optional)
string

Bus route, e.g.: 70, 10A.

(optional)
string

Center point Latitude, required if Longitude and Radius are specified.

(optional)
string

Center point Longitude, required if Latitude and Radius are specified.

(optional)
string

Radius (meters) to include in the search area, required if Latitude and Longitude are specified.

Request headers

string
Subscription key which provides access to this API. Found in your Profile.

Request body

Response 200

Default response code.



<BusPositionsResp
    xmlns="http://www.wmata.com"
    xmlns:i="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
    <BusPositions>
        <BusPosition>
            <DateTime>2014-10-27T13:23:40</DateTime>
            <Deviation>7.0000000000</Deviation>
            <DirectionNum>10</DirectionNum>
            <DirectionText>NORTH</DirectionText>
            <Lat>39.191525</Lat>
            <Lon>-76.672821</Lon>
            <RouteID>B30</RouteID>
            <TripEndTime>2014-10-27T13:17:00</TripEndTime>
            <TripHeadsign>BWI LT RAIL STA</TripHeadsign>
            <TripID>6794838</TripID>
            <TripStartTime>2014-10-27T12:40:00</TripStartTime>
            <VehicleID>6217</VehicleID>
        </BusPosition>
        <BusPosition>
            <DateTime>2014-10-27T13:23:19</DateTime>
            <Deviation>-1.0000000000</Deviation>
            <DirectionNum>12</DirectionNum>
            <DirectionText>SOUTH</DirectionText>
            <Lat>39.030003</Lat>
            <Lon>-76.948868</Lon>
            <RouteID>B30</RouteID>
            <TripEndTime>2014-10-27T13:29:00</TripEndTime>
            <TripHeadsign>GREENBELT STA</TripHeadsign>
            <TripID>6794867</TripID>
            <TripStartTime>2014-10-27T12:53:00</TripStartTime>
            <VehicleID>6215</VehicleID>
        </BusPosition>
        <BusPosition>
            <DateTime>2014-10-27T13:24:00</DateTime>
            <Deviation>2.0000000000</Deviation>
            <DirectionNum>10</DirectionNum>
            <DirectionText>NORTH</DirectionText>
            <Lat>39.011429</Lat>
            <Lon>-76.893158</Lon>
            <RouteID>B30</RouteID>
            <TripEndTime>2014-10-27T13:57:00</TripEndTime>
            <TripHeadsign>BWI LT RAIL STA</TripHeadsign>
            <TripID>6794839</TripID>
            <TripStartTime>2014-10-27T13:20:00</TripStartTime>
            <VehicleID>6213</VehicleID>
        </BusPosition>
    </BusPositions>
</BusPositionsResp>

Code samples

@ECHO OFF

curl -v -X GET "https://api.wmata.com/Bus.svc/BusPositions?RouteID=70&Lat={string}&Lon={string}&Radius={string}"
-H "api_key: {subscription key}"

--data-ascii "{body}" 

using System;
using System.Net.Http.Headers;
using System.Text;
using System.Net.Http;
using System.Web;

namespace CSHttpClientSample
{
    static class Program
    {
        static void Main()
        {
            MakeRequest();
            Console.WriteLine("Hit ENTER to exit...");
            Console.ReadLine();
        }
        
        static async void MakeRequest()
        {
            var client = new HttpClient();
            var queryString = HttpUtility.ParseQueryString(string.Empty);

            // Request headers
            client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Add("api_key", "{subscription key}");

            // Request parameters
            queryString["RouteID"] = "70";
            queryString["Lat"] = "{string}";
            queryString["Lon"] = "{string}";
            queryString["Radius"] = "{string}";
            var uri = "https://api.wmata.com/Bus.svc/BusPositions?" + queryString;

            var response = await client.GetAsync(uri);
        }
    }
}	
// // This sample uses the Apache HTTP client from HTTP Components (http://hc.apache.org/httpcomponents-client-ga/)
import java.net.URI;
import org.apache.http.HttpEntity;
import org.apache.http.HttpResponse;
import org.apache.http.client.HttpClient;
import org.apache.http.client.methods.HttpGet;
import org.apache.http.client.utils.URIBuilder;
import org.apache.http.impl.client.HttpClients;
import org.apache.http.util.EntityUtils;

public class JavaSample 
{
    public static void main(String[] args) 
    {
        HttpClient httpclient = HttpClients.createDefault();

        try
        {
            URIBuilder builder = new URIBuilder("https://api.wmata.com/Bus.svc/BusPositions");

            builder.setParameter("RouteID", "70");
            builder.setParameter("Lat", "{string}");
            builder.setParameter("Lon", "{string}");
            builder.setParameter("Radius", "{string}");

            URI uri = builder.build();
            HttpGet request = new HttpGet(uri);
            request.setHeader("api_key", "{subscription key}");


            // Request body
            StringEntity reqEntity = new StringEntity("{body}");
            request.setEntity(reqEntity);

            HttpResponse response = httpclient.execute(request);
            HttpEntity entity = response.getEntity();

            if (entity != null) 
            {
                System.out.println(EntityUtils.toString(entity));
            }
        }
        catch (Exception e)
        {
            System.out.println(e.getMessage());
        }
    }
}


<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
    <title>JSSample</title>
    <script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.9.0/jquery.min.js"></script>
</head>
<body>

<script type="text/javascript">
    $(function() {
        var params = {
            "api_key": "{subscription key}",
            // Request parameters
            "RouteID": "70",
            "Lat": "{string}",
            "Lon": "{string}",
            "Radius": "{string}",
        };
      
        $.ajax({
            url: "https://api.wmata.com/Bus.svc/BusPositions?" + $.param(params),
            type: "GET",
        })
        .done(function(data) {
            alert("success");
        })
        .fail(function() {
            alert("error");
        });
    });
</script>
</body>
</html>

#import <Foundation/Foundation.h>

int main(int argc, const char * argv[])
{
    NSAutoreleasePool * pool = [[NSAutoreleasePool alloc] init];
    
    NSString* path = @"https://api.wmata.com/Bus.svc/BusPositions";
    NSArray* array = @[
                         // Request parameters
                         @"entities=true",
                         @"RouteID=70",
                         @"Lat={string}",
                         @"Lon={string}",
                         @"Radius={string}",
                      ];
    
    NSString* string = [array componentsJoinedByString:@"&"];
    path = [path stringByAppendingFormat:@"?%@", string];

    NSLog(@"%@", path);

    NSMutableURLRequest* _request = [NSMutableURLRequest requestWithURL:[NSURL URLWithString:path]];
    [_request setHTTPMethod:@"GET"];
    // Request headers
    [_request setValue:@"{subscription key}" forHTTPHeaderField:@"api_key"];
    // Request body
    [_request setHTTPBody:[@"{body}" dataUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding]];
    
    NSURLResponse *response = nil;
    NSError *error = nil;
    NSData* _connectionData = [NSURLConnection sendSynchronousRequest:_request returningResponse:&response error:&error];

    if (nil != error)
    {
        NSLog(@"Error: %@", error);
    }
    else
    {
        NSError* error = nil;
        NSMutableDictionary* json = nil;
        NSString* dataString = [[NSString alloc] initWithData:_connectionData encoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding];
        NSLog(@"%@", dataString);
        
        if (nil != _connectionData)
        {
            json = [NSJSONSerialization JSONObjectWithData:_connectionData options:NSJSONReadingMutableContainers error:&error];
        }
        
        if (error || !json)
        {
            NSLog(@"Could not parse loaded json with error:%@", error);
        }
        
        NSLog(@"%@", json);
        _connectionData = nil;
    }
    
    [pool drain];

    return 0;
}

<?php
// This sample uses the Apache HTTP client from HTTP Components (http://hc.apache.org/httpcomponents-client-ga/)
require_once 'HTTP/Request2.php';

$request = new Http_Request2('https://api.wmata.com/Bus.svc/BusPositions');
$url = $request->getUrl();

$headers = array(
    // Request headers
    'api_key' => '{subscription key}',
);

$request->setHeader($headers);

$parameters = array(
    // Request parameters
    'RouteID' => '70',
    'Lat' => '{string}',
    'Lon' => '{string}',
    'Radius' => '{string}',
);

$url->setQueryVariables($parameters);

$request->setMethod(HTTP_Request2::METHOD_GET);

// Request body
$request->setBody("{body}");

try
{
    $response = $request->send();
    echo $response->getBody();
}
catch (HttpException $ex)
{
    echo $ex;
}

?>
########### Python 2.7 #############
import httplib, urllib, base64

headers = {
    # Request headers
    'api_key': '{subscription key}',
}

params = urllib.urlencode({
    # Request parameters
    'RouteID': '70',
    'Lat': '{string}',
    'Lon': '{string}',
    'Radius': '{string}',
})

try:
    conn = httplib.HTTPSConnection('api.wmata.com')
    conn.request("GET", "/Bus.svc/BusPositions?%s" % params, "{body}", headers)
    response = conn.getresponse()
    data = response.read()
    print(data)
    conn.close()
except Exception as e:
    print("[Errno {0}] {1}".format(e.errno, e.strerror))

####################################

########### Python 3.2 #############
import http.client, urllib.request, urllib.parse, urllib.error, base64

headers = {
    # Request headers
    'api_key': '{subscription key}',
}

params = urllib.parse.urlencode({
    # Request parameters
    'RouteID': '70',
    'Lat': '{string}',
    'Lon': '{string}',
    'Radius': '{string}',
})

try:
    conn = http.client.HTTPSConnection('api.wmata.com')
    conn.request("GET", "/Bus.svc/BusPositions?%s" % params, "{body}", headers)
    response = conn.getresponse()
    data = response.read()
    print(data)
    conn.close()
except Exception as e:
    print("[Errno {0}] {1}".format(e.errno, e.strerror))

####################################
require 'net/http'

uri = URI('https://api.wmata.com/Bus.svc/BusPositions')

query = URI.encode_www_form({
    # Request parameters
    'RouteID' => '70',
    'Lat' => '{string}',
    'Lon' => '{string}',
    'Radius' => '{string}'
})

if uri.query && uri.query.length > 0
    uri.query += '&' + query
else
    uri.query = query
end

request = Net::HTTP::Get.new(uri.request_uri)
# Request headers
request['api_key'] = '{subscription key}'
# Request body
request.body = "{body}"

response = Net::HTTP.start(uri.host, uri.port, :use_ssl => uri.scheme == 'https') do |http|
    http.request(request)
end

puts response.body