Houston TranStar Watcher

Overview

This skill is a specialized traffic monitor for the Greater Houston area. It interfaces with the Houston TranStar Real-Time Incident RSS feed to detect new accidents, stalled vehicles, and road closures.

Technical Runbook

The following logic is executed every 10 minutes via the internal cron scheduler:

1. Script Execution: The skill navigates to the local directory and executes the diff-check logic:

   python3 transtar_diff.py
   

2. Output Parsing: - If the script returns the string NO_CHANGES, the process terminates immediately to save bandwidth and prevent notification fatigue.

If any other text is returned, it is treated as a "Delta Report" of new incidents. 3. Delivery Logic When a "Delta Report" is generated, the content is formatted for mobile viewing and pushed via the WhatsApp Gateway to the configured recipient.

4. Use Cases Automated commute monitoring for Houston residents.