The Run-Times product is a powerful scheduling tool that compares observed (actual) run-times against your agency's scheduled run-time for every trip in your schedule. This data is then used to analyze and compare observed run times across periods of time, and even suggests run times that might be better suited to your system's operations.
Video Overview
The Basics
Summary: View your agency's historical run-time information in multiple formats and layouts. Understand whether trips are running according to their scheduled run-time, compare run-times between two different date ranges, and see how suggested run-times could improve your scheduling operations.
Filters: In the Run-Times product, you can view a summary of run time accuracy across your service, or hone in on a specific route's run-times. This information can be viewed for a single day, but for most analysis, we recommend selecting multiple weeks or months so as to generate a sufficient sample size. You may want to choose dates that align with a specific schedule pick or season, for example. You can even exclude specific dates that may impact run-times (snow days, holidays, events that disrupt service, etc.).
The filters will vary slightly between the three views in the Run-Times product. In most views, though, you will be able to specify which trip pattern that you are analyzing or adjust allowable minutes for early and late vehicles. Otherwise, other filter information will be explained in the specific view articles linked below.
View high-level run-times data – When you select the "All Routes" filter, you can see your agency's system-wide level performance for the time-window selected. This view shows you an overview of whether your routes are running shorter, longer, or "expected" as compared to their scheduled run-times. This high-level view essentially serves as a report card on the accuracy of your scheduling, and also as a quick way to identify routes that may be especially problematic and worthy of more attention.
Analysis: Click on any route in the overview page (or select it from the Filters panel) to view run-times data for each trip on that specific route. If you'd like to see trip-level details, click on any trip to see run-times data between stops for a single trip in the schedule.
Analysis views display captured trips: all trips with an observed first stop departure, a last stop arrival, and are completed by a single vehicle, regardless of whether any mid-trip stops were observed.
Both the route- and trip- level reports are available in three views:
- Components (described above) – the median breakdown of shortest observed travel time, variable travel time, and dwell.
- Distribution – shows a distribution of the overall run times recorded during this time period.
- Percentile – sorts the distribution into 10th, 50th, and 90th percentile breakdowns. These percentiles are customizable from the gear icon in the upper-right corner.
Distribution and Percentile views allow users to see the spread of their running times, rather than the median values shown in the Components view. This is critically important for gaining information into the feasibility of improving the schedule on a given route, as routes with consistent running times will generally be easier to schedule. In general, users may prefer to use the distribution view except when looking at large sample sizes, where the percentile view can offer a more condensed summary.
Comparison View: The Comparison tab allows you to compare, side-by-side, the observed run times of two different time frames for the same route. This is great for comparing:
- Impacts of specific events as compared to the norm
- Negative impact of construction along a route path
- Positive impact of transit infrastructure, bus-only lanes, or signal priority projects
- Variances between different days of the week
Suggestion: The Suggestion view uses data referenced from the Analysis and Comparison views to generate suggested run-times that may improve on-time performance for a route. This view compares the potential on-time performance of your existing scheduled run-times with Swiftly's suggested run-times. OTP values for both current and suggested run times assume that vehicles always depart the first stop on-time.
Learn more about how Suggested Run Times are calculated by Swiftly here or click the "i" (information) icon in the upper-right portion of the dashboard screen.
Export your data: You can easily export the underlying Suggested Run-TImes data in our dashboard to CSV so you can merge with other data sets or run your own analyses.
The analysis view includes both trips with complete data (complete trips) as well as trips with enough data that Swiftly can infer the run-times (incomplete trips). Captured trips represent the set of complete trips + included incomplete trips. The suggestion and comparison views only include complete trips.
Complete Trip: A trip observation that has an arrival or departure observed for every scheduled stop and:
- The stop observations are in order (each arrival or departure time is greater than or equal to the one for the previous stop)
- The observed departure time for the stop is greater than or equal to the observed arrival time of the stop
Incomplete Trip/Partial Trip: A trip observation that is missing both an arrival and departure for at least one stop.
- If an arrival or departure is observed for every stop, but in the wrong order, the trip will still be considered “incomplete” in the Run-Times product, and it will not be available in the trip-level analysis views.
- Paths from the stops that were observed on the trip will be available in the single trip analysis views (path-observations and path-stats).
Captured Trip: A trip with an observed first stop departure, last stop arrival, and was completed by a single vehicle. Regardless of whether the mid-trip stops are observed, the trip will be available in the trip-level analysis views.
- Paths from the stops that were observed on the trip will be available in the single trip analysis views.
Run-Times Analysis View
The Run-Times Analysis view gives you a deep understanding of how your routes are performing in accordance with their scheduled run-times. This view provides insights into whether trips' schedules are too tight or have extra slack that can be cut. In the Run-Times product, the analysis view hosts trip specific information and clearly breaks down how each trip on each route compares to your scheduled run-times.
The analysis tab includes both trips with complete data (complete trips) as well as trips with enough data that Swiftly can infer the run-times (incomplete trips). Captured trips represent the set of complete trips + included incomplete trips.
For ease of analysis, trips are grouped into the same row if they have the same scheduled start time, scheduled runtime, next trip scheduled start time, trip pattern. If two trip are different in any of those dimensions, they will be in different rows.
Complete Trip: A trip observation that has an arrival or departure observed for every scheduled stop and:
- The stop observations are in order (each arrival or departure time is greater than or equal to the one for the previous stop)
- The observed departure time for the stop is greater than or equal to the observed arrival time of the stop
Incomplete Trip/Partial Trip: A trip observation that is missing both an arrival and departure for at least one stop.
- If an arrival or departure is observed for every stop, but in the wrong order, the trip will still be considered “incomplete” in the Run-Times product, and it will not be available in the trip-level analysis views.
- Paths from the stops that were observed on the trip will be available in the single trip analysis views (path-observations and path-stats).
Captured Trip: A trip with an observed first stop departure, last stop arrival, and was completed by a single vehicle. Regardless of whether the mid-trip stops are observed, the trip will be available in the trip-level analysis views.
- Paths from the stops that were observed on the trip will be available in the single trip analysis views.
Run-times data from the dashboard can be exported using the download button in the header. This gives users the flexibility to dive deep into the data and create custom visualizations. The returned data includes travel time, run-time and dwell time information for observed trips, and scheduled runtime information for all scheduled trips, regardless of whether they were observed. Note: Only captured trips will return a value for observedRuntimeSeconds, otherwise observedRuntimeSeconds will be null.
Filters
With the Analysis view, you can look at a certain route in a specific direction. On that route and that direction, you can either look at "All Trips" or a specific trip on that route to get a trip's stop by stop comparison of scheduled versus observed run-times. You can also look at run-times for a single day or over a longer date range. In this specific view, you can exclude dates that may impact on-time performance (snow days, events that disrupt service, etc.).
You can customize parameters and add filters –if a certain route has multiple trip patterns, you can select which trip pattern you want to analyze. In the percentile view, specifically, you may adjust the percentiles - the defaults are 10th, 50th, and 90th percentile - to better match how your agency looks at run-time percentiles.
The Three Charts:
The route- and trip-level reports are available in three views:
- Components (described above) – the median breakdown of shortest observed travel time, variable travel time, and dwell.
- Distribution – shows a distribution of the overall run times recorded during this time period.
- Percentile – sorts the distribution into 10th, 50th, and 90th percentile breakdowns. These percentiles are customizable from the gear icon in the upper-right corner.
Components
Dive deep with route - and trip-level run-times reports– Click on any route (or select it from the Filters panel) to view run-times data for each trip on a given route. Click on any trip to see run-times data between stops for a single trip.
These run-time reports are broken up into 3 components:
-
Shortest observed travel time is represented by light blue – Conceptually, this represents the fastest possible run time for a trip if a vehicle were to have perfect light timing, no traffic, and no boardings. The shortest observed trip travel time (in minutes) in the selected date
range. If the date range is less than a week, then it’s the shortest trip travel time observed in the week prior to the selected end date. - Variable travel time is represented in dark blue. This is time added that is related to congestion, traffic lights, or other delays while the vehicle is in motion.
- Dwell times are represented in purple. This is time spent stationary at stops, likely spent loading or unloading passengers. (note: any time spent stationary at a traffic light that is not also a bus stop would be considered variable time).
Collectively, these distinctions may reveal certain patterns, such as a specific stop with high dwell due to heavy boardings, a higher variable time during the morning peak, etc.
If there are no complete trips for a given start time, Swiftly is unable to differentiate each component and thus will show a single bar which shows the total run-time.
Distribution
Be able to quickly decipher problem areas with scheduled run-times by understanding if certain trips in a schedule are always behind or ahead of schedule, or if there are one or two vehicles that tend to skew the average scheduled run-time.
On the chart, each trip on a route will have blue dots that represent a vehicle's observed run time and show the scheduled run-time (green bar) and next trip start for that vehicle (brown bar). The dots will be laid out according to the observed run time. If all the blue dots are clustered on the distribution chart, then it shows that each vehicle in that trip has a similar observed run time, and if all the vehicles are scattered on the chart then the trips have very different scheduled run-times.
These patterns can help you pinpoint where actionable run-time readjustments could have a big impact (on distributions that are very close together and one change can make a big difference), or can shed light on one vehicle's observed run-time that could be skewing the data.
Hover over the blue dots to get more information on:
- Trip Number
- Scheduled run-time
- Next trip start time
- Observed run-time
- Longer or shorter than scheduled by
- Day
- Date
- Vehicle ID
Percentile
Hone in on what percentile your trips' observed run-times fall into. Many agencies understand scheduled run-times through percentiles, and with this chart, you can quickly gauge whether your percentiles fall within the scheduled run-time, under the scheduled run-time, or above it. This chart helps you view whether the majority of your trips fall within the range of your scheduled run-times and whether the outliers (10th or 90th percentiles) fall outside of the scheduled ranges.
The colored dots represent the set percentiles - defaults being 10th, 50th, and 90ths, and the green and brown bars are scheduled run-times and the next trip start.
Hovering over a dot will give you more information on:
- Trip ID
- Number of trips
- Scheduled run-time
- Next trip start
- [x] percentile time
- Longer or shorter than scheduled by
Run-Times Comparison View
The Comparison view allows you to compare, side-by-side, the observed run times of two different time frames for the same route. Understanding stop by stop run-times quickly shows you that different dates and time ranges can have drastic impacts on observed run-times, and can help you pinpoint certain stops and moments on a route that could use schedule changes to better impact run-times.
This view is great for comparing:
- Weekend v.s. weekday differences
- The impact of specific events as compared to the norm
- Negative impact of construction along a route path
- Positive impact of transit infrastructure, like bus-only lanes
Filters: With the Comparison view, you can look at a certain route in a specific direction. On that route and that direction, you can get a trip's stop by stop comparison of observed run-times.
Choose your time frames by selecting "Date & Time Range" in the Filters panel. Choose days of the week, times of day, and exclude certain days. Select "Range 2" to choose the second time frame to compare with.
You can also select certain trip patterns. A certain route has multiple trip patterns, you can select which trip pattern you want to analyze.
Get stop-level details by hovering over the line graph (observed run times) such as the elapsed run-time, average dwell at that stop, and the number of data points being analyzed.
Run-Times Suggestions View
The Suggestion view in the Run-Times product uses data referenced from the Analysis and Comparison views to generate suggested run-times that could increase potential on-time performance for a route. This view can help you find slack in your schedule to cut down on operating costs or help to identify routes that need more time to improve performance.
Suggested Run-Times only analyzes trips with complete data (complete trips). A complete trip is one that has an arrival or departure observed for every scheduled stop. Suggested run-times was designed specifically this way to provide the most accurate suggestions by looking at fully served trips. If an vehicle made a trip detour that resulted in even one stop being missed, the detour path could still be long enough to add a significant amount of time, which would affect the overall timing recommendations. Therefore, in an effort to be confident and accurate in our recommendations, Swiftly only includes complete trips when making suggestions.
Filters: With the Suggestion view, you can look at a certain route in a specific direction. You can also look at run-times for any date range - be sure to pick at least 4 weeks of data from the Filters panel to be sure you're working with a healthy data set. Keep in mind, you can exclude dates that may impact on-time performance (snow days, events that disrupt service, etc.).
Under the Display settings in the Filters panel, you can make further adjustments to:
- Service ID – Pick which service ID you want to analyze (Swiftly will automatically display the service ID with the most data).
- Trip pattern – Pick which trip pattern you want to analyze (Swiftly will automatically display the service ID with the most data).
- Stop type – View "All Stops" or operational "Timepoints".
- Allowable Minutes – Adjust the on-time performance standard used to suggest run-times.
- Run-Time Format – Display suggested run-times in either whole minutes or minutes-and-seconds.
Tip: If you click the expand button above "Trip Pattern" you can show a map view of the route you are analyzing. This map will also show you the various trip patterns you can choose between.
Suggested Run-Times Deep-Dive
Compare Potential OTP of your existing scheduled run-times with Swiftly's suggested run-times. This comparison will tell you how much your potential OTP could increase by adopting Swiftly's run-times suggestions. The suggestion view will show you overall Potential OTP comparisons for the whole route, or specifically for each time band on a route. OTP calculations assume that vehicles always depart the first stop on-time.
View Cumulative or Non-Cumulative Run Times by checking the box in the upper-right portion of the screen. Cumulative run-times will show the elapsed run time of each displayed stop, which means the time values will add up until the final stop. While non-cumulative will reveal the run time differences between each segment of the route, which will show a mutually exclusive run-time between stops.
Cumulative Run-Times:
Non-Cumulative Run-Times:
Compare Swiftly's suggested run-times with Your current scheduled run-times by checking the box in the upper-right portion of the dashboard screen.
This allows you to do a side-by-side comparison of your current run-times to the ones we suggest. This helps you clearly see the difference between the two different run-times. Your current run-time is the brown value on the screen.
Download suggested run-times into a CSV file by clicking the downward arrow button. Learn more about downloading your run-time data.
Learn more about how Suggested Run Times are calculated by Swiftly here, or click the "i" (information) icon in the upper-right portion of the dashboard screen.
FAQs
Why are timebands slightly different from trip start times
Swiftly is looking at the trip schedules and grouping all consecutive trips with the same scheduled run-times into the same timeband. We try to round the timeband start times to nearest 15 minutes when we can so that the display time is cleaner. We set the displayed endtime of the previous timeband to end 1 minute before the start of the next so that it is obvious which timeband a 6:00 trip belongs to, for example.
Take Run-Times Beyond the Basics
Swiftly Customer use cases:
- Baltimore Develops a Golden Method for Transit Signal Priority
- Swiftly Restores Transit Calm on the Oregon Coast
Customer Community Training Webinars:
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