fare-data MCP server

New here? Follow the step-by-step SETUP.md to get running.

Exposes ATPCO fare CSV snapshots (the ~119-column fare feed layout: CXR, ORIG, DEST, Fare Class, Fare AMT, Tax AMT, Total Price AMT, Cabin, restrictions, …) from a local folder to Claude via the Model Context Protocol, plus a live fare-shopping tool backed by engine-wrapper-service.

Data directory

Drop your fare CSVs into the data folder. Resolution order:

1. FARE_DATA_DIR environment variable, if set

2. ../fare-data (a folder named fare-data next to this repo), if it exists

3. ./data inside this repo

Any *.csv with the fare-feed header layout is picked up automatically; no restart needed when you add or replace files (each tool call re-reads the directory).

Related MCP server: Business Intelligence MCP Server

Tools

shop_fares notes

• Requires the internal engine-wrapper endpoint (corporate network/VPN). Configure it via ENGINE_WRAPPER_URL — copy .env.example to .env and fill in the URL (ask your team; it is deliberately not committed) — or pass endpoint_url per call (e.g. to hit the historical wrapper).

• origin, destination, carrier are required; everything else defaults to the standard request: dates (travelDate, asOfDateTime, ticketDate) default to the current date/time in engine format (e.g. 02AUG26T1119), hostCarrier defaults to carrier, userId defaults to ATP1XXX, trip type OW, daysStay 7.

• Any other request field can be set through the overrides dict, which is merged last and wins (e.g. {"taxes": false, "validateCategories": "15"}). An override set to null removes that field from the request entirely.

• Responses whose parsed JSON exceeds max_response_chars (default 200000) return a preview only, to protect the LLM context window. Programmatic callers should pass max_response_chars: 0 for complete data.

Setup

cd fare-mcp-server
python3 -m venv .venv
.venv/bin/pip install -r requirements.txt
cp .env.example .env   # then fill in ENGINE_WRAPPER_URL

Running without Claude

Claude is just one MCP client — the server runs standalone and anything that speaks MCP (or plain Python) can drive it.

Raw stdio mode (what any MCP client spawns):

.venv/bin/python server.py

It waits silently for JSON-RPC on stdin — normal for a stdio server. Ctrl+C to exit.

MCP Inspector — interactive web UI to browse and call the tools (best for development, debugging, and demos; requires Node):

npx @modelcontextprotocol/inspector .venv/bin/python server.py

From a Python script — the MCP client library is already installed in the server's venv:

import asyncio
from mcp import ClientSession, StdioServerParameters
from mcp.client.stdio import stdio_client

async def main():
    params = StdioServerParameters(command=".venv/bin/python", args=["server.py"])
    async with stdio_client(params) as (read, write):
        async with ClientSession(read, write) as session:
            await session.initialize()
            result = await session.call_tool("list_fare_files", {})
            print(result.content[0].text)

asyncio.run(main())

No MCP at all — the tools are plain Python functions:

.venv/bin/python -c "import server, json; print(json.dumps(server.list_fare_files(), indent=2))"

Register with Claude Code

From the directory where you cloned this repo:

claude mcp add --scope user fare-data \
  --env FARE_DATA_DIR="$(pwd)/../fare-data" \
  -- "$(pwd)/.venv/bin/python" "$(pwd)/server.py"

(--env FARE_DATA_DIR=... is optional — see the resolution order above.)

Register with Claude Desktop

Add to ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json, replacing <repo> with your clone's absolute path:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "fare-data": {
      "command": "<repo>/.venv/bin/python",
      "args": ["<repo>/server.py"]
    }
  }
}

Then restart Claude Desktop.

Use from FarePulse-Agent

FarePulse-Agent can route its wrapper snapshot calls and competitor probes through this server: clone the two repos side by side and set FARE_MCP_ENABLED=1 in FarePulse-Agent's .env (see the "fare-data MCP server" section of its README).

Example prompts once connected

• "What fare files are available?"

• "Show me the cheapest business-class fares in MEX_LAX_28Jul.csv"

• "Summarize fares by cabin in the 28Jul file"

• "What changed between the 10Jul and 28Jul MEX-LAX snapshots?"

• "Shop live fares for ADL-LAX on FJ, one way"