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Call-prep brief · checked 2026-07-09

Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA)

Grade F · 46.7 / 100

Down 0.4 points since 2026-07-08 (F to F).

For this call: lead with the grade and the three fixes below, then confirm the feed is current and the NTD details line up. Each fix is framed as a next step, not a failure.

What changed since the last check

  • Correctness no change
  • Freshness down 1.7
  • Rider experience no change
  • Realtime quality no change

Top three things to fix

  1. Re-generate shape distances in your export; flag to your vendor if it persists.

    Some trips have stop times whose distances along the route go backwards. Apps can show buses jumping backwards or mis-order stops.

    Effort: Usually an export-tool fix, not hand editing.

  2. Check the vehicle positions endpoint with your AVL vendor; it should return a fresh GTFS-Realtime protobuf on every request.

    The vehicle positions realtime feed failed during sampling. When this feed is down, riders see scheduled times presented as if they were live.

    Effort: Usually a vendor support ticket.

    Agencies here usually clear this within about 1 week (based on 9 observed fixes).

  3. Check the service alerts endpoint with your AVL vendor; it should return a fresh GTFS-Realtime protobuf on every request.

    The service alerts realtime feed failed during sampling. When this feed is down, riders see scheduled times presented as if they were live.

    Effort: Usually a vendor support ticket.

    Agencies here usually clear this within about 1 week (based on 5 observed fixes).

NTD certification readiness: Needs attention

This feed is close to NTD-ready. 1 validator error to resolve.

Published Ready
Published at a public URL.
Valid Needs attention
1 validator error to resolve.
Current Ready
Service data covers the next 42 days.

agency_id and NTD ID: Not aligned. Your feed's agency_id is 1; your National Transit Database ID is 90036. A feed that serves several agencies (a shared regional feed) can legitimately carry more than one agency_id, so a difference here is a heads-up, not an error. Optionally set the agency_id for your service to 90036 in agency.txt (and the matching agency_id in routes.txt) so the feed lines up with your NTD record. It is a convenience, not a required feed change: FTA also links agency_id to your NTD ID on your P-50 form.

The bar this score answers to

The published guideline in California is California Transit Data Guidelines. Caltrans' published quality guidelines and compliance checklist; this rubric is anchored to them.

Key facts

Feed URL
https://www.octa.net/current/google_transit.zip
Last checked
2026-07-09
Service window
30 days of service data remain. Last service date 2026-08-08.
State
California

Part of the California portfolio: see where this agency sits among the state's feeds before the call.

A data-quality and completeness read to support an agency conversation. Not an official compliance determination. Rubric v1.1, validator 8.0.1.