Road transport – Overview

Brief Description

Road traffic data includes all static and dynamic (real-time) data necessary to map road traffic.

The data can be made available thanks to close cooperation with the Federal Roads Office (FEDRO) and the Swiss Federal Office of Energy (SFOE).

Data and interfaces

IMPORTANT: The FEDRO General Terms and Conditions apply to the data of the FEDRO. For more information please see the general information of FEDRO.

Note: A description of how to access the dynamic APIs can be found here: Howto: Access our APIs with API Keys

Functional Description

The FEDRO provides data on road traffic, i.e. traffic volume (traffic counters) and light signalling systems.

The SFOE provides data on the charging stations at www.ich-tanke-strom.ch (the documentation can be found on Github). The SFOE also provides the locations and availability of shared mobility services.

In terms of infrastructure, in the interests of intermodal transport, we provide data on Park & Rail parking facilities and bike parking facilities.

Vehicle Pooling

We are currently working on making Switzerland’s vehicle pooling services available as data and/or APIs.

A common understanding of Vehice Pooling in Switzerland is essential for a central web service that makes it possible to query all available vehicle pooling offers and demands in Switzerland.

To this end, we conducted an extensive market study and developed a proposal for a future data exchange standard based on the established GTFS format.

Our publication is available here: https://www.öv-info.ch/sites/default/files/2024-01/vehicle_pooling_switzerland_v1.0.pdf

Once this service is implemented, we will create a separate page for it.

Explanations of terms

Term	Description
Light signalling systems	E.g. traffic lights
Rotation	A rotation refers to the time and route taken by a single vehicle. As a rule, the rotation starts when the vehicle leaves the depot/garage and ends when it enters again. The vehicle can also be parked in the meantime, in which case the rotation usually continues. However, the vehicle can also enter the depot/garage and exit again in the meantime. The rotation then stops or starts again. Depending on the company, it is the same rotation or two different rotations. The identification is as follows: There must not be two rotations with the same ID at the same time. The individual segments of a round trip from final stop to final stop are the journeys. A round trip therefore consists of an exit, several alternating journeys with turning times and an entrance.
Vehicle Pooling	There are different definitions of vehicle pooling and many synonyms, such as: Carpooling, Ride Sharing, Carsharing, «Mitfahrgelegenheit», «Fahrgemeinschaft» oder «Fahrdienstvermittlung». In ‘Part 5’ of the NeTEx definition, vehicle pooling is defined as follows: ‘Specific mode of operation of a private vehicle (car, motorcycle, etc.). Expressed by dividing the vehicle for a journey between a defined driver who already is involved in the journey, and at least one other passenger.’ For our purposes, this definition refers to the transport of goods and commercial Expanded services. A detailed description can be found in our documentation.