https://github.com/brenns10/bart

BART fare reduction
https://github.com/brenns10/bart

algorithm bart flask linear-programming numpy python scipy

Last synced: 6 days ago
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BART fare reduction

• Host: GitHub
• URL: https://github.com/brenns10/bart
• Owner: brenns10
• Created: 2016-07-21T17:13:47.000Z (almost 9 years ago)
• Default Branch: master
• Last Pushed: 2016-12-12T08:05:13.000Z (over 8 years ago)
• Last Synced: 2025-06-10T18:43:59.770Z (10 days ago)
• Topics: algorithm, bart, flask, linear-programming, numpy, python, scipy
• Language: JavaScript
• Homepage: https://brennan.io/2016/07/23/bart-fare-hacking/
• Size: 727 KB
• Stars: 11
• Watchers: 2
• Forks: 0
• Open Issues: 0
• Metadata Files:
  • Readme: README.md

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README

        
BART Fare "Hacking"

===================

This is a demonstration of some really cool algorithm concepts, applied to the

San Francisco BART system. The idea is to "swap" tickets among train riders so

that the trips appear shorter and everyone's fares go down. You can find a

better description of the

idea [here](https://brennan.io/2016/07/23/bart-fare-hacking/).

This program is a server that runs a very rudimentary API and a Javascript

frontend program for the server. You can do simple experiments with small

amounts of riders, or you can run large-scale experiments on real BART data. You

can test it all out for yourself:

    pip install -r requirements-dev.txt

    export FLASK_APP=bart/app.py

    export FLASK_DEBUG=1

    flask run --host=0.0.0.0

Ethics

------

This is an academic demonstration of modeling a real-world problem as an

optimization problem, formulating it as an integer linear program, and using the

resulting formulation as the basis for an algorithm.

This app, if it were real, would steal from a public transportation system. That

is wrong. However, this app could never be real for several reasons:

1. You would need to be able to swap tickets and cards electronically. This

   currently is not practical.

2. To successfully reduce fares, this system needs many users. To gain users,

   this system needs to demonstrate that it can reduce their fares. It is nearly

   impossible for an app like this to gain traction.

3. No curated app store would host an app that games the BART system. No

   distribution means no adoption.

4. It would not be hard for BART to mitigate this quickly.

So at the end of the day, this is a harmless exercise in algorithms.