Google Integrations: Guidance for Swiftly Customers

How Google integrations work

Swiftly will manage your agency’s integration of real-time information into Google, with your permission and very little involvement from your agency required (optionally, agencies can always manage the integration themselves). 

Google’s real-time transit prediction integrations are available for public fixed-route systems (services where any passenger from the public can board). Private shuttles, such as corporate or university systems, and services with high amounts of deviated fixed-route services (or “flexible fixed-route”) are not eligible. 

Swiftly can manage the integration of several transit data sets: 

• GTFS-static
  • Many agencies already have this information integrated.
  • For those that don’t, Swiftly can support the integration of your static GTFS file. This must be completed first before moving on to GTFS-realtime integration. 
• GTFS-realtime, Trip Updates
  • Captures the predictions of your service. 
  • For customers who’ve purchased Swiftly’s Service Adjustments solution, this dataset will also include trip cancellations and stop closures, adjusted stop times, and some detour information. 
• GTFS-realtime, Vehicle Positions
  • Captures the location of vehicles for your service. 
• GTFS-realtime, Service Alerts
  • Tells passengers about current or future service disruptions that may affect their trip.
  • This is available to customers who’ve purchased Swiftly’s Rider Alerts solution. 
  • Google requires at least one alert to be populated in this dataset in order to complete integration. 

Integration timeline

Google’s integration timelines can vary widely based on your data quality and the 

For agencies who need…

• First-time GTFS-static integration and GTFS-rt integration: ~8-10 weeks to complete
• GTFS-rt integration only (Trip Updates, Vehicle Positions, Service Alerts): ~4 weeks to complete
• GTFS-rt Service Alerts integration only: ~2 weeks to complete 

Ensuring a fast and seamless integration

Here are a few things you can do to make sure that your integration with Google goes smoothly and quickly: 

1. Designate an IT contact or GTFS-savvy person to support the Google integration
   • There may be questions about your service or data, and having a responsive and knowledgeable contact to work with is proven to speed up the process.
2. Make sure that the website information matches your GTFS-static
   • Specifically: Routes, route colors, and schedules posted to your website must match the data found in your GTFS
   • Google is known to reject integrations if there is a mismatch between GTFS and your public website
3. Make sure you have agency contact information populated in the agency.txt GTFS-static file
   • Agency_name, agency_url, agency_phone, and agency_email fields should all be populated
   • More information about the agency.txt file.

Data quality practices and considerations

The quality of your real-time data can have a big impact on the length and duration of your Google integration. Here are a few known ways that Google integrations have gotten tied up, delayed, or even canceled: 

• Trip IDs, Block IDs, and/or Route IDs mismatches between vehicles and the GTFS
• Infrequent real-time vehicle position updates – such as low-frequency GPS service (greater than 30-second reporting rate). 
• High amounts of unexplained missing service (such as detours or deviations that are not explained by service adjustments)
• GTFS for service changes should be uploaded at least seven days prior to being in effect

First-time GTFS-static integrations

For agencies that are getting their GTFS-static integrated for the first time, Google requires these agencies to sign a license agreement for your agency’s data to Google for integration into its products, with terms for updates, confidentiality, and termination.

You can read a sample agreement here: Sample Google Transit Agreement.