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Understading the 511 API

making a simple request

• find a stop id for a VTA bus stop near school
• go on the 511 open data documentation and find the correct url to get stop predictions
• open the url in the browser, make sure you use your api key in the url, there should be a response with the transit predictions

parsing the response with python

• using the above url, make an HTTP request in python
• parse the JSON response with python, print out the below

1. the name of the stop
2. each route and its upcoming arrival times

parsing with dataclass

1. try following along this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9B9CdKANjnM
2. use dataclass to store the response from the API, like

from dataclass import dataclass
import typing


@dataclass
class Prediction:
  route: str
  times: typing.List[str]

@dataclass
class Stop:
  id: str
  name: str
  prediction: typing.List[Prediction]

p1 = Prediction(
  "66",
  [
    "2023-12-28T01:36:02Z",
    "2023-12-28T01:54:35Z",
    "2023-12-28T02:11:46Z",
  ]
)
p2 = Prediction(
  "68",
  [
    "2023-12-28T01:49:19Z",
    "2023-12-28T02:00:27Z",
    "2023-12-28T02:19:29Z",
  ]
)
s = Stop("63211", "1st & Reed", [p1, p2])
print(s)

• the Stop object will hold the stop id, stop name, and list of predictions
• a prediction will hold the route name and array of timestamps for when the bus is arriving