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Use a Real-Time Reporting System That’s Available on the Web 24/7

So many vehicles. So many routes. So many riders. So many variables. Running a modern transit system presents daunting challenges for the very best transportation executives.

Having the right reporting tools in place make a dramatic difference in your team’s ability to operate your system at peak efficiency in spite of the many variables your system faces day in and day out.

The Right Reports Simplify Transit Operations in Even the Largest and most Complicated Systems.

NextBus management reports provide transit executives and supervisors a set of powerful tools to manage their fleet. With these tools, managers get reports on the activities and performance of a single vehicle or route or multiple vehicles and routes selected by the manager. All are easily accessible over the Internet.

The reports are simple to use and provide essential management information, including details on vehicle headways and timepoint schedule adherence.

Management reports are essential for understanding where, why, and how problems are occurring in the system. This knowledge gives dispatchers and supervisors insight into ways to better distribute their resources and results in smoother system operations.

NextBus management reports are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, providing up-to-the-minute information. Data is stored indefinitely so that valuable reports comparing current and archived data can be created and analyzed.

NextBus standard reports cover most of the information required for managing headway and schedule adherence, from a list of vehicles running and job scheduling, to more complex reports covering details of individual vehicle runs timepoint adherence, and others.

Standard NextBus management reports will enable you to improve:

• Schedule adherence
• Headway management
• Missed blocks
• Vehicle reporting
• Bus operator performance

Performance measurement becomes an easier task with the right set of tools. NextBus management reports provide information you need to optimize your transit operations.

These days, with severely strained resources, those management tools are more important than ever.

Fort Myers Beach Trolley Leverages NextBus to Make for an Easy Riding Experience

LeeTran of Fort Myers operates an extensive system of regular buses throughout the city and in surrounding Lee County–an area covering hundreds of square miles. Most of their buses operate along traditional routes with frequent schedules that empower commuters and shoppers who choose public transit over autos.

For beautiful Fort Myers Beach, they do something much different. They operate a classic trolley that covers the length of the barrier island from Fort Myers on the north to Bonita Springs.

In peak season, the trolley is the most sensible way to travel because the single N-S road is jammed with vacationers and snowbirds.

The only hitch is that the beach trolley runs with a typical headway of 40 minutes or more.  That means it is essential to know when the next bus will be arriving in the direction you want to go.  The team at LeeTran selected NextBus real-time information solutions to provide up to the minute alerts for riders.

In fact, we received a thoughtful email from a regular vacationer who remarked on what a positive difference NextBus had made:

I vacation in Ft. Myers every summer and just love the trolley service.  Last year it was pretty helpful.  This year was so much better because of NextBus.  I could see when the trolley was getting very close so I could leave a store and get to the stop in time. This helps me so much.

Your passengers count on public transit to get them where they want to go.  Real-time passenger information from NextBus always makes life easier for customers and transit executives even with frequent bus arrivals. But, when riders must adjust to the Fort Myers Beach trolley’s forty minute headway, LeeTran’s investment in NextBus technology really made a positive difference for its customers.

AC Transit Makes Excellent Use of the Web to Turn Taking the Bus or the Train the Obvious Transportation Choice

AC Transit has created ACT for Me as “Your Guide to the Future of Public Transit.”  They illustrate why AC Transit should be an integral part of your life by sharing a creative range of content—from user-generated videos, to a savings calculator, to a discussion of community and environment benefits, and the exciting future of transit.

Lots of images of happy riders with capsule explanations of their love of AC Transit make an authentic case for their service.  For example, they quote Reginald James, a rider since 1986, “By taking AC Transit I don’t have to worry about rising gas prices and vehicle maintenance costs. Plus, I enjoy riding the bus. I like talking to the different bus drivers and I really appreciate the free wireless internet on the transbay buses.”  Mr. James and his many fellow, real-live riders suggest that becoming an AC Transit regular would be not only the right thing but perhaps even the enjoyable thing to do.

You may well be facing challenges in marketing your systems as the smart alternative to clogged roadways and greenhouse gases. Take a look at what AC Transit is doing on the web to promote public transit 24 hours a day, seven days a week: ACTforMe.org

Mike Shares Secrets of NextBus Round-the-Clock Automated Predictions and The Productive Partnership with SF Muni

Muni Diaries is an example of blogging at its best. This is how the blog team describes themselves: We are a ragtag group of San Franciscans who love the ups and the downs, the good and the bad stories in and around the buses and light-rail cars in our city. But we can’t emphasize enough that we want Muni Diaries to be a user-generated exercise in storytelling.

Not only do they tell great stories but their obvious love of and concern for San Francisco’s public transportation system shines through their wide range of articles.  Their extensive Q&A with Mike Smith will help you understand how tough transportation challenges can be managed effectively when the vendor and the transit system work together to deliver continually improved operations.

To give you a flavor of the interview and of Muni Diaries, here are brief excerpts on the topics of real-time info and partnering with SF Muni from the March 6, 2009 interview:

MD: Does somebody just sit there and manage this information, as it comes in? How does that part work?
Smith: The system is pretty much all automated, and that’s how it can run 24 hours a day. Basically all of the generated information is based on the GPS information, and that comes in real time. And also, we use historic information. We know from gathering data how long it typically takes a bus to go from one stop to another, and that’s based on time of day, and all sorts of different conditions. So the system really runs on its own. The main thing that we do is monitor to make sure it’s working and deal with configuration changes. Muni and other transit agencies, they typically make changes once every three months; sometimes there are changes in between that. Those configuration changes are always a good amount of work.

MD: You mentioned that it’s a partnership between NextBus and Muni to ensure this works properly. How often do you chat and what are some of the latest things you’ve discussed to make sure it does indeed run smoothly?
Smith: We definitely talk to them every day. It takes quite a bit of effort to make sure the trackers are working and that the configuration is correct. We also get feedback from passengers, and sometimes it’s issues we can deal with, sometimes it’s issues we need to pass on to Muni, and so we’re always doing that. And, of course, Muni passes us information, too. It’s not like you can buy a NextBus system, plug it in and expect it to work. There’s just an amazing number of complexities that happen every day. And so we always have to be monitoring to make sure the system is working.

To read all of this in-depth interview, including information on a new texting capability now being tested by NextBus, click here: Muni Diaries

 

The venerable Daily Targum reported on the expected disruptions that campus road construction will cause to student and community riders of the university bus system. 

Director of Transportation Services Jack Molenaar and Manager of Transportation Planning Jennifer Stuart Lane hosted a transportation forum March 25, 2009 to present the department’s proposed changes to bus routes and parking permit rates for the upcoming year.

The Rutgers community has already benefitted significantly from the NextBus system. Since its 2005 launch at Rutgers, NextBus has helped reduce student complaints by 35%. This, of course, is a relief in itself; however, fielding fewer complaint calls also leads to increased efficiency, productivity, and job satisfaction among transit employees at both the administrative and operational levels. And with 65,000 riders each day, increasing student satisfaction with transit services was no easy task without NextBus technology.  

The NextBus real-time passenger system will mitigate the disruptive effect of these changes by keeping riders current on arrivals for every changed stop or altered route.

NextBus Can Isolate Instances of Bad Driver Behavior

The forum also gave an opportunity for students to express particular concerns about driver behavior. Molenaar indicated that NextBus reporting tools could identify instances of bad driver behavior from recorded videos.  This enables transportation officials to take corrective action promptly.

The Daily Targum reported just how transit managers can benefit from NextBus technology:

Students raised concerns about bus drivers not stopping at stops or not stopping when they flag down the BrunsQuick Shuttle. Molenaar and Lane said students should contact the department when this happens.
“We can actually go into NextBus and track that. If you give us the time and just get the bus number we can then see yes, they did not stop for you and bring it up and show them the video and show the bus going by,” Lane said.
Molenaar said with the NextBus technology, they can go back and rewind every route and see exactly what a driver did or didn’t do and can view video at their stops, which have cameras.
“We do have drivers that aren’t good sometimes, and when they get a number of complaints we then ask that driver to be removed from service,” Molenaar said.

 

Intelligent Transportation System Delivers Tangible ROI

Research conducted by Battelle in Northeast Florida for the U.S. DOT illustrated how an ITS delivered significant operational savings across four contiguous counties.

The Northeast Florida Rural Transit ITS project was a demonstration of successful technology deployment in four rural transit Community Transportation Coordinator (CTC) agencies: St. Johns County, Putnam County, Marion County, and Flagler County. Each contiguous county had a rural population with large urban medical facilities located outside its designated service areas.

The following immediate priorities were the basis for implementing an ITS system with the NextBus type capabilities:

• Improve scheduling operations by creating tighter driver assignments and reducing the workload associated with daily scheduling, call intake, and driver-manifest creation.
• Synchronize dispatch and scheduling operations to reduce the dispatcher’s workload by providing better information to the dispatcher.
• Improve workforce management including driver assignments.
• Improve vehicle maintenance strategies

The project’s most profound effects were related to productivity, through more effective scheduling, dispatching, and fleet control. Overall, staff time requirements decreased. Productivity improvements that were experienced in St. Johns County by implementing scheduling software include:

• Reducing office staff from 9 full time equivalents (FTEs) to 4.5 FTEs, resulting in a savings of $58,000 per year.
• A decrease in staff time from four full-time operators to two despite the increase of calls from 150 per day to 300 per day.

Click here to access to full report: Northeast Florida Rural Transit Intelligent Transit System.

An $80,000 Real-time Passenger Information System Delivers More Value than a New Mini-Bus

Because you can quantify the return on smart transit technology investments, you can be confident in the value of adding real-time passenger information technology. You can make a simple, but accurate comparison to the purchase of new buses just as in our case study.  And, you can keep your passengers happy without breaking the bank.

A representative case in point

Business at the Ajax Hotel and Resort is booming! The resort typically attracts several thousand daily customers, and a new addition to the resort complex allows Ajax to accommodate 3,000 overnight guests. Most of these guests travel by private automobile to the resort so that the resort has had to increase parking capacity by constructing satellite parking lots.

Read more

The transit industry is experiencing an unprecedented combination of factors that seriously affect transit service provision.  Rising fuel costs have driven many commuters to use public transit as their primary method of transportation to and from work.   To make matters worse, motor fuel tax revenues are down as Americans traveled 3.3% fewer miles during the second quarter of 2008.  The bottom line is that transit agencies are attempting to do much more with much less. That’s where ITS solutions from NextBus come in.

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Lack of GPS AVL system makes the work much more challenging than it needs to be

In order to optimize the service it provides to its community, the University made a number of changes including the addition of new buses. According to Campus Times, the school and its partner First Transit were able to make significant improvements, but had to invest a lot of elbow grease and people hours to make it happen.  

Many of the issues facing the University transit system were people related.  There were numerous difficulties with operator behavior that negatively impacted the quality of service.  Initially, the only way to achieve improved operator performance was to monitor manually routes, schedules, buses, and operators.

Read more