Lightweight Real-Time Alerts with Notepad Tables: A Hack for Small Transit Ops

When the enterprise feed dies: a 12‑minute fix you can run from Notepad

Missed connections, frantic call centres and blank departure boards are the most visible signs when an agency’s enterprise realtime system fails. For small operators that can’t wait for vendor support, a simple, reliable failover built from plain text tables and a few scripts is the fastest way to restore public-facing delay pages and keep riders moving. This guide shows how to set that up right now using Notepad tables (yes, the new tables feature), CSV/pipe tables, and minimal scripts — no heavy stack, no cloud finger‑pointing.

Top takeaway (if you only read one paragraph)

Keep a single human‑editable plain text table as your canonical, on‑prem fallback. When the realtime API fails, update the table in Notepad, run a one‑liner script (PowerShell, Python or Bash) to convert it into a small static HTML “delay page” and publish via SFTP, GitHub Pages or a local web server. Add an SMS/email notify step for critical routes. Drill this runbook monthly so it becomes a reflex.

Why lightweight failovers matter in 2026

Late 2025 and early 2026 saw two trends push transit teams toward low‑tech resilience:

• High‑profile outages and supply‑chain incidents made agencies realise large vendor platforms are powerful but not immune. When they go down, riders need clear, immediate information.
• There’s a growing movement to reduce tool sprawl. As the MarTech world warned in 2026:

  “Marketing stacks with too many underused platforms are adding cost, complexity and drag.”

  The same applies in operations: fewer, well‑practised tools beat many orphaned systems when seconds matter.

Microsoft’s inclusion of tables in Notepad for Windows 11 (rolled out to many users in the mid‑2020s) makes plain text editing faster for non‑technical dispatchers — a small but meaningful improvement for contingency operations.

The core concept: plain text as your canonical fallback

Use a single, simple text file as the source of truth during failures. Keep it in one of these formats so scripts can reliably parse it:

• Pipe‑delimited text (|) — human‑readable, avoids comma quirks.
• CSV — widely supported, but watch embedded commas or quotes.
• Markdown table — easy to preview; many converters exist.
• Aligned ASCII table — great in Notepad with the tables feature.

Example of a recommended pipe‑delimited file (save as delay-table.txt):

Route|Direction|Scheduled|Status|Platform|Notes
10|Outbound|12:15|Delayed 10 min|Bay 2|Signal problem at Elm St
22A|Inbound|12:30|Cancelled|—|Driver shortage, replacement advised
5|Outbound|12:45|On time|Bay 1|—

Failover runbook: a 12‑minute plan

When the realtime feed dies, follow this prioritised checklist. Timing assumes one trained operator with access to the web server or file upload credentials.

1. 0–2 min: Confirm outage and raise incident. Switch to manual mode: open delay‑table.txt in Notepad.
2. 2–5 min: Update the table with affected routes and estimated delays. Save.
3. 5–8 min: Run the conversion script to create index.html (scripts below). Preview locally.
4. 8–10 min: Publish page — SFTP/FTP, GitHub Pages or local server. Verify page loads on public network or hotspot.
5. 10–12 min: Trigger alerts for high‑impact routes (email/SMS) and post to social channels. Start a 15‑minute cadence for updates.

Scripts you can use right now

Below are small, copy‑pasteable scripts. Choose the one that matches your environment. All assume a source file called delay-table.txt using pipe delimiting with header row.

PowerShell (Windows — recommended for Notepad users)

This script reads the pipe file and writes a simple auto‑refreshing HTML page.

$src = 'C:\ops\delay-table.txt'
$out = 'C:\ops\www\index.html'
$rows = Import-Csv -Path $src -Delimiter '|'
$ts = Get-Date -Format 'yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss'
$html = @"



  
  
  
  


  
Service Updates (Updated: $ts)
  
"@

foreach ($r in $rows) {
  $html += "    `n"
}

$html += "    \n  

    
Route
Direction
Scheduled
Status
Platform
Notes
    
$($r.Route)
$($r.Direction)
$($r.Scheduled)
$($r.Status)
$($r.Platform)
$($r.Notes)
\n\n"

$html | Out-File -FilePath $out -Encoding utf8
Write-Host "Wrote $out"

Python (cross‑platform)

#!/usr/bin/env python3
import csv, datetime
src = 'delay-table.txt'
out = 'index.html'
rows = list(csv.DictReader(open(src), delimiter='|'))
now = datetime.datetime.now().strftime('%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S')
with open(out,'w',encoding='utf-8') as f:
    f.write(f"""








Service Updates (Updated: {now})

""")
    for r in rows:
        f.write('' + ''.join(f'' for h in ['Route','Direction','Scheduled','Status','Platform','Notes']) + '\n')
    f.write('\n

Route
Direction
Scheduled
Status
Platform
Notes
{r.get(h,"")}
\n\n')
print('Wrote', out)

Bash + awk (Linux, macOS)

Quick conversion using awk — useful on small servers.

awk -F'|' 'NR==1{print ""; for(i=1;i<=NF;i++)print ""; print ""; next} {print ""; for(i=1;i<=NF;i++)print ""; print ""} END{print "
"$i"
"$i"
"}' delay-table.txt > body.html
printf '%s\n' "<!doctype html><html><head><meta http-equiv=\"refresh\" content=\"60\"></head><body>" > index.html
cat body.html >> index.html
printf '%s\n' "</body></html>" >> index.html

Publishing options: choose the right path for speed and control

Pick the simplest reliable publishing method you already have access to. Prioritise one with known credentials and a tested path.

• SFTP/FTP to your existing web server — usually the fastest for teams with an IT partner.
• GitHub Pages — create a repo and upload index.html in the web UI; great for teams comfortable with GitHub. You can preconfigure a simple repo and keep credentials in a secure password vault.
• Netlify Drop or similar — drag and drop an index.html to publish if you have an account ready.
• Local hosting — if your public hosting is down, run python -m http.server 8000 on a laptop with a mobile hotspot and share the IP on social channels.

Whichever path you choose, document the steps and store credentials in an encrypted vault accessible to the incident owners.

Adding alerts: email and SMS with tiny scripts

For critical routes, send a short SMS or email when a manual update goes live. Keep templates simple and pre‑approved.

SMS via simple HTTP API (example with Twilio curl)

curl -X POST https://api.twilio.com/2010-04-01/Accounts/ACxxx/Messages.json \
--data-urlencode "To=+15551234" \
--data-urlencode "From=+15559876" \
--data-urlencode "Body=GreenLine 10 delayed 10min at Elm St. See: https://yourdomain/updates" \
-u 'ACxxx:your_auth_token'

Note: Twilio and similar services require preconfigured accounts and phone numbers. Test them during drills and integrate with your on-device and mobile publishing workflows.

Email via PowerShell (quick, internal)

$smtp = 'smtp.yourdomain.org'
$msg = new-object system.net.mail.mailmessage
$msg.from = 'alerts@yourdomain.org'
$msg.to.add('ops-team@yourdomain.org')
$msg.subject = 'Service Alert: Route 10'
$msg.body = 'Route 10 delayed 10 min. Live updates: https://yourdomain/updates'
$smtpclient = new-object system.net.mail.smtpclient($smtp)
$smtpclient.send($msg)

Design and content best practices for delay pages

Keep the page actionable and scannable. Use these fields in your table and display:

• Route, Direction, Scheduled time, Status (delayed, cancelled, on time), Platform, Notes.
• Include an explicit last updated timestamp and an auto‑refresh (30–120s) so riders see changes quickly.
• For high‑impact incidents, include a short recommended alternative (e.g., “Take 12 to Central, walk 6 min to Main St bus stop”).
• Make the page print‑friendly and accessible (large type, high contrast). Most riders may screenshot or print if cell signal is patchy.

Governance: roles, signatures and audits

Simple tools need strong process. Define:

• Who can edit the table (dispatchers, duty officer).
• Who must approve public posting (incident lead) for major disruptions.
• How long updates remain in manual mode before reconciling with the enterprise feed.
• Log changes: keep historical copies (timestamped files or a simple append log) to reconstruct decisions during post‑incident reviews — consider tying logs to explainability and audit tooling such as explainability APIs for post‑mortems.

Case study: GreenLine Transit (hypothetical)

At 07:12 on a winter morning, GreenLine’s realtime vendor API returned 503 for all vehicle positions. Phone volumes spiked. Using the procedure below, the dispatcher restored public updates in 11 minutes:

1. Opened delay‑table.txt in Notepad and added three affected routes (2 min).
2. Ran a prepared PowerShell script to generate index.html (2 min).
3. Uploaded via SFTP to the agency web server (4 min).
4. Sent templated SMS to 500 subscribed riders using a preconfigured Twilio curl (3 min).

Outcome: the website had a live delay page; inbound calls decreased 38% in the next 30 minutes and social posts were muted because riders saw authoritative info.

Security and operational risks — and how to mitigate them

Low‑tech doesn’t mean low‑security. Address these risks:

• Credentials: Store SFTP/API keys in an encrypted vault, not in plain text on the laptop.
• Access control: Use role separation — one person edits, another publishes for major incidents.
• Data integrity: Keep checksum or signed copies if required by compliance teams.
• Availability: Keep alternate publishing paths and a mobile hotspot and portable power so you can publish if internal networks are down.

Trends and predictions for 2026 and beyond

Expect three developments to shape these contingency patterns:

• Edge publishing and static site tooling: More agencies will rely on prebuilt static pages and serverless endpoints for failovers because they’re cheap, fast and less attackable than full backend systems. Netlify/Cloudflare Pages adoption for contingency pages rose in late 2025.
• OS‑level usability improvements: Notepad tables make it easier for non‑technical staff to maintain tabular data quickly — a small change but helpful in pressure situations.
• AI summarisation as a helper: By 2026, teams increasingly use small AI assistants to draft clear passenger notices from technical incident notes — for these, consider edge AI and on-device summarisation, but agencies must guard against overreliance and always have a human review step for public safety messaging.

Drill schedule and continuous improvement

Make this failover an operational habit. Recommended cadence:

• Weekly quick checks (5 minutes): open table, run conversion, verify publish path.
• Monthly full drill (15–20 minutes): simulate outage, run the full 12‑minute plan with updates to SMS/email and social.
• Quarterly review: review logs, update templates and rotate credentials.

Actionable checklist: copy this into your operations binder

1. Store a canonical plain text table (pipe‑delimited) in a known folder.
2. Keep a tested PowerShell/Python conversion script in the same folder.
3. Preconfigure a publish method (SFTP/GitHub Pages/Netlify) and store credentials in a vault.
4. Prepare SMS/email templates and test the API/SMTP credentials monthly.
5. Run a live drill within 30 days and schedule ongoing cadence.

Closing argument: why simple wins when time matters

Enterprise realtime systems are powerful, but when they fail the public only sees silence. A lightweight, documented failover that uses Notepad tables, a single source text file and a short script gives small transit operators the control to restore passenger communications in minutes. It reduces call volumes, keeps platforms calmer and protects rider trust.

“When systems fail, clarity wins. A simple table and a tested script will get you back online faster than a complex vendor ticketing cycle.”

Next steps (call to action)

Start a 15‑minute drill this week: save the sample pipe‑delimited table above, copy the PowerShell or Python script into the same folder and run it. If you want our ready‑to‑use template files and a one‑page runbook you can print for the dispatcher desk, download the package from our toolkit page (or email ops@schedules.info for the ZIP). Share your drill results with your network — contingency planning gets better when teams share what works.

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