How technology will transport us

Technology touches everything these days, and the field of transportation is no different – several developments are currently underway that will make a big difference to the way we get around.

The ways we travel and make our daily decisions are going to change dramatically over the next 20 years. One of the key drivers of this change is technology and, in particular, the proliferation of internet-enabled, locationsensitive mobile devices and the data they produce. These devices will both provide travelers with transportation information and also provide network operators with data and a platform to manage and improve services, monitor and manage traffic flows, and build customer relationships.

Another driving force is the availability of open transit data sets to smart phone app and website developers. Transit data sets in particular are driving exciting new mobile app developments that focus on journey planning, including pushing real time departure information to people via smart phone and text messaging. This new approach to information dissemination is beginning to look far more financially attractive to transit agencies, with the focus on providing data rather than investing in infrastructure such as digital displays.

The Greater Boston Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) has been data available to developers; its release of static and real-time transit data has led to the development of a number of popular journey planning iPhone and Android apps.

It’s not just transit riders who are benefiting from open data and smart phone apps – Open Street Map (OSM), the ‘Wikipedia of mapping’, is beginning to integrate bicycle links and bikefriendly routing information around the world. In the UK, open sourced mapping and routing data is driving a number of cycling journey planning websites, including Dundee City Council’s multimodal travel portal (www.dundeetravelinfo.com). What makes open data attractive is that it can be edited by anyone – including bicycle and community groups – and it’s global. It gives people ownership over the mapping of their local area, and if someone updates a link to indicate the availability of a bike lane, for example, this will automatically be picked up by OSM-powered journey planners and will provide a better quality result to everyone.

Ticketing is also going mobile, with a number of train operating companies now offering electronic ticketing and contactless ‘near field communication’ (NFC) systems that allow payments to be made with a wave of a smart phone. Technology’s ace of development is opening up numerous ways to apply it in transportation, and as some of the examples above show, the application need not involve great expense. It’s simply a matter of taking advantage of technology to create a better connected, more mobile society.