Improving Intelligent Transport Systems information to end users to make transport more sustainable

By Dr Ing Stefano Mainero, CEO & Founder, EPN Consulting Limited

In these days when we talk about Intelligent Transport Systems we mean a world of technology, intelligent infrastructures, on-board-vehicle devices, data exchange and communications, front-end and back-end system, etc. All these can be applied to a variety of environments such as Public Transport (PT), private vehicles, Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGVs), Logistics, traffic management, fleet management, motorway networks, urban road networks, etc.

From these few lines it is easy to see how much the ITS subject has become complicated in recent times. The immediate question that comes to our mind is: "What was ITS designed for?". Basically ITS were designed to reduce congestion on road networks; then with the evolution of technology and the increase of new needs ITS expanded and encompassed new areas such as smart ticketing, road user charging, electronic toll collection, etc.

As the world of ITS is so vast we have to focus on some aspects and a crucial one regards information provided by ITS to end users.

We can play multiple roles as end users: when we drive our car and when we travel on Public Transport (buses, trains, airplanes and ferries to a certain extent) either we are in a city or in a motorway, either we are in our own country or in a foreign one.

The key concept is that we make better use of transport infrastructures and services when we are able to receive timely, consistent and effective information in the right moment and on the right informative support.

Travelling by car and by Public Transport

Travelling by car and by Public Transport is the most common way of travelling and regards nearly all of us during both our business and leisure time.

When we drive our car we need to know whether there is congestion ahead and if so which alternative route we could take to arrive on time at our final destination. The most common way of conveying this information is publishing it on Variable Message Signs (VMS) that, after being installed on motorways, have now also appeared in cities where additional items of information are displayed such as parking slots availability in the areas we are travelling through.

These systems have improved the sustainability of private transport as informed end users drive more efficiently and produce less pollution. A big help has been recently brought in by latest editions of Personal Navigation Devices (SatNavs and smartphones equipped with maps, both of them enabled with On-The-Air (OTA) Traffic Information Service).

There is still some work to do to make information timelier and more reliable, but the current situation is certainly much better than that one in the past decade.

When we travel by Public Transport though, the situation becomes more complicated as information, when available, is not integrated with other PT services and is not easy to find.

In mid-sized and big cities it is quite common to find Real Time Passenger Information at bus stops where items of information such as the next buses of the services calling at that specific bus stop are displayed. Usually these systems are pretty reliable and in great expansion because they make urban Public Transport more attractive. The currently existing problem is that these information systems are not integrated with other timetables (coaches, trains, airplanes, ferries...). This lack of integration regards both the venues and the internet-based information services.

As a matter of fact, when we arrive at airports it is very unlikely that an intermodal transport screen is installed and displaying information on next buses/coaches/trains to city centres of other cities.

The same happens when arriving at railway or coach stations where urban transport digital timetables showing updated information are nearly impossible to find.

The problem, as mentioned before, exists also on internet-based information services. Actually we have two problems: one regarding the information integration and another one regarding the portability of information.

PT Information integration

There are only few examples of web portals able to provide exhaustive information about multimodal transport opportunities. Usually transport services have got their own website and the majority of times is pretty hard to find other transport-related websites. This inconveniency exponentially increases when we have to search for this kind of information in foreign countries where often information is provided in their local language only.

Portability of PT information

The ideal solution of information portability would see us in the convenient position of searching for relevant information no matter what device (computer, laptop, netbook, tablet PC, smartphone), Operational System or Internet browser we use. Unfortunately this is not the case at all.

With regard to computers most of the transport service information websites are designed for MS Internet Explorer only and with a screen resolution of 1024x768. Other browsers are not recognised so that either nothing is displayed or what is displayed is not clickable.

With regard to smartphones, for those transport information websites that envisage a mobile service it is often a lottery to guess their URL: some times is www.website.com/mobile, some others is m.website.com or mobile.website.com or even still different.

As you can see it is not easy to find crucial information and when this item of information is not integrated, the result is that people travelling by Public Transport will hire a car at their final destination rather than using PT services and will contribute to increase the CO₂ emissions.

We suggest that Public Transport companies, local authorities and all those involved in dealing with passenger transport would focus their energies on creating a common platform that could gather all information concerning transport services. This platform would be easily found on the web and could be displayed on any computer and smartphone available on the market. This would hugely increase the passengers switch from personal vehicles to Public Transport with a number of positive consequences such as lower travelling costs, less congestion and cleaner air.

About

Dr Ing Stefano Mainero
EPN Consulting Limited
CEO, Founder

EPN Consulting is happy to support clients that would be interested in receiving ITS market intelligence and state-of-the-art analysis as well as to be assisted in finding innovative ITS solutions.