RTPI Digital Signage At Bus Stops

There are circa 400,000 bus stops across the UK. PassageWay believe they should all have RTPI.

Did you know there are approximately 400,000 bus stops  across the UK? (source: National Public Transport Data Repository). Some of these bus stops will have bus shelters and some of those will have some form of real-time passenger information, akin perhaps to the TfL countdown dot matrix type displays. But many will be simple flag poles on the side of the road with a printed timetable. The challenge facing Transport Authorities is how to turn these lonely bus stops into effective demand generators. 

In sales parlance, if you consider bus stops as the funnel by which customers enter the public transport network, then real-time passenger information (RTPI) is the bait that will reassure them that the service will be delivered. And the better the information supplied then the more customers feel reassured that their journey is in safe hands and that they have made the right modal decision. In short, the issue is that people are much less likely to choose public transport without access to real-time information for services that meet their needs.

But, the problem is how to get the real-time information to customers. Mobility apps may appear to provide the answer but fewer than 20% of smartphone users have downloaded a smart mobility app and far fewer use them. Equally SMS 'text me back' services are unpopular and deliver unsatisfactory static information.

In terms of audience, it's worth noting there are significant numbers of low digital use public transport customers who don't want to download an App, register, login, or pay for information and then there are those who are entirely digitally excluded (circa 300K in London alone according to a recent Lloyds report). 

Budget constraints alone mean that RTPI Screens are extremely unlikely to ever become commonplace at all bus stops and an ad-funded model is unlikely to gain traction as many bus stops are low frequency use, possibly remote and therefore ROI will be unachievable. Equally expecting customers to pay for information via SMS is not an attractive sales proposition. 

The PassageWay team considered these constraints alongside what we'd like to see at a bus stop when we set out to develop concepts for a RTPI Bus Stop Digital Sign: 

1. Real-time passenger information (RTPI) for the specific bus stop, without having to undertake any interaction or further navigation

2. Real-time information for the next bus service departures

3. Any disruption notifications that may affect the bus route service 

4. Route information including estimated time to reach each stop

5. Onward travel status for trains or other modes (if appropriate)

Alongside the customer information we also considered that Transport Authorities and their partners would wish to promote links to their mobility/ticketing Apps or to highlight promotions or events.. 

We wrapped these requirements into Bus Stop RTPI Digital Signage concepts for several Transport Authorities including Transport for London (TfL) and  Transport for Victoria (TfV) and E-Sussex county council. 

The resultant PassageWay approach delivers a light touch digital sign. Displaying a personal digital sign on a customer device when they scan a QR code at a bus stop. Opening on a customer devices inbuilt browser, the personal digital sign requires no registration, login or download and updates automatically every few seconds without intervention. Further, the RTPI bus stop digital sign displays helpful route information that automatically rotates between the available services at the bus stop along with onward travel status, promotional content and links to download official Apps. Some additional benefits of this approach are that a customer can bookmark their bus stop digital sign or share the url with friends or family.  Whilst digitally excluded users cannot benefit from the personal digital signs approach the use of URLs to distribute digital signs means that a community can easily display digital signs on Internet connected screens via just a web browser, for example in a school, hospital, pub, post office, library, community centre or other venue meaning that real-time information can easily be made available to a much wider audience. 

Bus Stop Digital Signage Concept (Transport for Victoria - Melbourne)

This concept shows how the bus stop digital sign would display on a customers personal device once they scan a QR code at a suitable bus stop.

Key Features

1. Information updates automatically every 60 seconds without need to refresh

2. Next service clearly identified and following services can further extend with animation

3. Route maps rotate with weighting given to the next service. Onward stops plus estimated journey times are supplied based upon real-time information from source,.

4. Disruption information highlighted at the top of the sign to ensure the customer is alerted.

5. General support information and links to official App downloads and can also include news alerts for the authority or council.

6. Because the bus stop digital sign is supplied as a URL it can be easily shared or displayed on a larger format screen with a modern web browser.