The real benefits of real-time transit data

#News(General) [ via IoTForIndiaGroup ]

A Sidewalk Talk Q&A with researcher Candace Brakewood on all the ways it improves our lives — and its role in a potential car-free urban future.
It’s been a little more than a decade since Google and TriMet, the transit authority for Portland, Oregon, partnered to create a standardized format for scheduled transit data called GTFS. That breakthrough, and the subsequent rise of vehicle location data, has made real-time transit information an essential part of urban life, from the arrival screens at train platforms or bus stands to the smartphone apps that help people plan trips.

The primary benefits include reduced wait times (people use an app to time their walk to a stop or station), reduced travel time (people adjust their trip choices), and increased transit use (people like reduced wait and travel times). In time, the higher-order impact stands to be even greater: a future where integrated real-time data from all transportation options enables a true mobility system that rivals private car use on convenience.

“The more we can get to those multi-modal, real-time transportation apps, the better informed the traveler will be and the better choices they can make,” says Brakewood. She spoke to Sidewalk Talk about the science of real-time transit data — and its role in a potential car-free urban futur

It’s totally different on the train versus bus side. On the bus side, it’s AVL [automatic-vehicle location]. In that case, if you don’t have AVL on your vehicles, that is more of a capital investment. That’s going to be a fairly large investment, but there will be many additional benefits in addition to the passenger benefits on the operating side. It’s much easier operations when you know where vehicles are.

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