Making city transport smarter with the smartphone

Brian Zanghi, CEO, Masabi

Smart Cities are all about the implementation and adoption of integrated technology to improve urban life, and there is no better example than the impact the smartphone is having on urban transport systems.

With the accelerating shift toward urbanisation, greater demands are being placed on already over burdened transportation networks. As public transportation becomes increasingly more critical to driving economic development, transportation operators will need to ensure they are maximising their investments while balancing ageing vehicles, infrastructure and ticketing architecture. Without an optimised network, cities cannot realise their full economic potential, as they face a vicious cycle of less and less visitors, fewer headquartered companies and diminishing incentives to invest in housing, says Brian Zanghi, CEO of Masabi.

However, simply increasing capacity is not an option for many cities. Building more subway tunnels, buying additional buses or adding more ticket machines are all expensive options and require more space than some cities have to spare, often prohibitively so. Instead, cities around the world are turning to technology – in particular the smartphone – to provide solutions; improve network utilisation and creating vital savings for infrastructure investment while also dramatically improving trip experience for the end-user.

It is hard to think of a mode of transportation that hasn’t utilised smartphone technology to its benefit. From mobile-based boarding passes for air travel, to applications for bicycle or car hire, parking, ride hailing, and across all modes of public transport; the smartphone is at the heart of moving people more efficiently around urban ecosystems by providing users with unprecedented levels of information and convenience.

Mobile ticketing benefits cities, transport operators, authorities and passengers alike. No longer does paying for a journey need to involve queuing and fumbling for cash or ticketing media. Gone are the days of waiting to get to the station, bus stop, or ferry pier only to find out your train, bus, tram, subway or ferry is delayed or isn’t running. By putting the means to purchase tickets and access up-to-the-minute service information at the tap of a screen, the smartphone has redefined the urban travel experience.

masabi_jr_imgMobile Ticketing also provides operators with a previously unimaginable wealth of ridership insight including revenues, rider usage and density; enabling better network planning and capacity optimisation on a daily basis and providing continuously updating live data that previously took months to gather.

Mobile ticketing is deployment-proven in cities around the world. In Boston, where mobile ticketing saved the MBTA $70 million as opposed to upgrading existing ticketing sales architecture, more than a third of the ridership already utilise the mobile sales channel with overwhelmingly positive feedback on user experience. In Athens, where the authorities introduced mobile ticketing across all modes of public transport, the process of travel has been revolutionised. Where previously passengers had to visit a metro station to purchase tickets, even if riding the bus, now they can be ready to turn up and travel with a few taps of their device.

Mobile ticketing is just one of many mobile apps and services being developed to help people navigate cities.  Each app does a fantastic job in the niche they are designed for, be it parking, bike share or route planning. Masabi believes that the next step in Smart City development is to create an ecosystem of tightly integrated apps for seamless, frictionless, door-to-door journeys – making it simple for the user to transact across several different services. By utilising a common set of APIs and standards it is possible for multiple applications to interact allowing the user to surf between services in the same way they would on the web. The result is stress free, frictionless travel using your smartphone. Masabi is working with major partners, such as Mastercard, to define and build the Smart City app ecosystem, and provide links within ticketing apps that connect with route planning services to help make journeys better. But, this is just the start; over the next two years ecosystems will be built around the specific needs of individual cities, to help make Smart Cities a reality.

Changes such as these – improving the efficiency of the entire transport network, with minimal capital expenditure for operators and no disruption to services for users, while at the same time improving the profitability of the fare collection process – illustrate the potential that the smartphone has to improve everyday urban life.

The author of this blog is Brian Zanghi, CEO of Masabi.

Comment on this article below or via Twitter: @IoTNow_ OR @jcIoTnow

RECENT ARTICLES

Semtech enhances global connectivity with NTN support in HL78 modules

Posted on: March 29, 2024

Semtech Corporation has announced the integration of non-terrestrial network (NTN) support into its HL series LPWA modules, specifically the HL7810 and HL7812. This significant advancement showcases a leap forward in enabling uninterrupted global connectivity even amidst the most challenging conditions.

Read more

Enhance EV charging performance with cellular connectivity

Posted on: March 28, 2024

Electric vehicles (EVs) are steadily growing their market share at the expense of internal combustion engine vehicles. The growth is fuelled by several factors. Perhaps most importantly, prices for EVs have started to drop as competition in the industry is intensifying. New players and models are emerging, prompting several established EV makers to lower their

Read more
FEATURED IoT STORIES

What is IoT? A Beginner’s Guide

Posted on: April 5, 2023

What is IoT? IoT, or the Internet of Things, refers to the connection of everyday objects, or “things,” to the internet, allowing them to collect, transmit, and share data. This interconnected network of devices transforms previously “dumb” objects, such as toasters or security cameras, into smart devices that can interact with each other and their

Read more

The IoT Adoption Boom – Everything You Need to Know

Posted on: September 28, 2022

In an age when we seem to go through technology boom after technology boom, it’s hard to imagine one sticking out. However, IoT adoption, or the Internet of Things adoption, is leading the charge to dominate the next decade’s discussion around business IT. Below, we’ll discuss the current boom, what’s driving it, where it’s going,

Read more

9 IoT applications that will change everything

Posted on: September 1, 2021

Whether you are a future-minded CEO, tech-driven CEO or IT leader, you’ve come across the term IoT before. It’s often used alongside superlatives regarding how it will revolutionize the way you work, play, and live. But is it just another buzzword, or is it the as-promised technological holy grail? The truth is that Internet of

Read more

Which IoT Platform 2021? IoT Now Enterprise Buyers’ Guide

Posted on: August 30, 2021

There are several different parts in a complete IoT solution, all of which must work together to get the result needed, write IoT Now Enterprise Buyers’ Guide – Which IoT Platform 2021? authors Robin Duke-Woolley, the CEO and Bill Ingle, a senior analyst, at Beecham Research. Figure 1 shows these parts and, although not all

Read more

CAT-M1 vs NB-IoT – examining the real differences

Posted on: June 21, 2021

As industry players look to provide the next generation of IoT connectivity, two different standards have emerged under release 13 of 3GPP – CAT-M1 and NB-IoT.

Read more

IoT and home automation: What does the future hold?

Posted on: June 10, 2020

Once a dream, home automation using iot is slowly but steadily becoming a part of daily lives around the world. In fact, it is believed that the global market for smart home automation will reach $40 billion by 2020.

Read more

5 challenges still facing the Internet of Things

Posted on: June 3, 2020

The Internet of Things (IoT) has quickly become a huge part of how people live, communicate and do business. All around the world, web-enabled devices are turning our world into a more switched-on place to live.

Read more