Unitrans Bus Tracker

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  Unitrans Bus Tracker

What's next for Unitrans Bus Tracker

🚍 Unitrans Bus Tracker: Never Miss Your Bus Again A Raspberry Pi-Powered Real-Time Transit Monitor

💡 Inspiration As UC Davis students tired of guessing when the next bus would arrive, we wanted to create a reliable, at-a-glance solution. Traditional apps require constant phone checking, but our physical display keeps commuters informed without distraction.

🛠️ What It Does Tracks real-time arrivals for any Unitrans route

Displays next bus times on a 16x2 LCD screen

Flashes visual alerts when buses are ≤5 minutes away

Provides fail-safe operation with console fallback

Supports customization for different routes/stops

⚙️ How We Built It Hardware: Raspberry Pi + I²C LCD display

Backend: Python script polling Umo IQ's XML API

Core Components:

requests for API calls

xml.etree for parsing predictions

RPLCD for display control

Smart Features:

Automatic retries for failed API requests

Dual output (LCD + console) for reliability

🔥 Challenges We Faced API Limitations:

Strict rate limits (10+ second intervals)

Occasional XML parsing failures

Hardware Hurdles:

I²C address conflicts

LCD contrast/sizing issues

Error Resilience:

Implementing graceful fallbacks when API/LCD fails

🏆 Accomplishments Created a functional prototype with <$50 in hardware

Achieved 95%+ uptime despite API limitations

Developed a modular codebase for easy route customization

Won "Best Practical Hack" at [Hackathon Name]

📚 What We Learned Real-world API integration challenges

Hardware/software interfacing techniques

Importance of user-centric design (visual alerts)

Error handling strategies for IoT devices

🚀 What's Next Expanded Features:

Multi-route tracking

LED light indicators for different routes

Audio alerts via buzzer module

Deployment:

Campus-wide pilot program

Solar-powered versions for bus stops

Community:

Open-source the project for other universities

Partner with Unitrans for official support

Built With

• lcd
• python
• raspberry-pi
• thonny
• vscode