Transportation · head-to-head
Transport for Berlin, Germany vs Transport for Denver, US
vbb-rest is an open-source, community-built REST wrapper around VBB's official HAFAS backend for Berlin and Brandenburg public transit, covering stop search, departures, journeys, and live vehicle positions in the Friendly Public Transport Format (JSON). It's keyless and free, now on its 6th major version — the previously indexed v3 endpoint is deprecated in favor of v6.vbb.transport.rest.
RTD Denver's original gtfs-developer-guide.shtml page is gone after a full site rebuild (now 404s); the transit agency's open-data offering now lives under open-records/open-spatial-information, split into static GTFS zip downloads (bus, light rail, commuter rail, plus the regional Bustang service) and three GTFS-Realtime protocol-buffer feeds (vehicle positions, trip updates, alerts). No API key is required, only acceptance of a redistribution license agreement.
| Transport for Berlin, Germany | Transport for Denver, US | |
|---|---|---|
| Authentication | None | None |
| Pricing | free | free |
| Formats | JSON | GTFS, GTFS-RT |
| CORS | yes | no |
| HTTPS | Yes | Yes |
Transport for Berlin, Germany supports CORS, while Transport for Denver, US doesn't — pick Transport for Berlin, Germany for direct browser calls.