Skip to main content

iPhone app for citizens to report highway defects

People in the UK county of Buckinghamshire can now use an Apple iPhone to photograph and report a pothole, loose paving, broken bollard or faulty street light. Developed by Masternaut for Transport for Buckinghamshire (TfB), the app captures a digital image of the defect with its geolocation and transmits it back to highway maintenance teams. This gives highways managers important information direct from the scene, which helps with managing response levels and providing better service. "Using this app, i
April 19, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
People in the UK county of Buckinghamshire can now use an 493 Apple iPhone to photograph and report a pothole, loose paving, broken bollard or faulty street light. Developed by 748 Masternaut for 1880 Transport for Buckinghamshire (TfB), the app captures a digital image of the defect with its geolocation and transmits it back to highway maintenance teams. This gives highways managers important information direct from the scene, which helps with managing response levels and providing better service.

"Using this app, iPhones provide much more detailed information than a standard telephone call or email. Buckinghamshire residents who have these smartphones are our eyes on the street. They help us to review the nature of the problem and see its location. We would normally have to visit the scene to get this level of intelligence before deciding on a course of action," says Marc Evans, ICT Systems Manager.

Transport for Buckinghamshire is a partnership between Buckinghamshire County Council and highway infrastructure services provider 4931 Ringway Jacobs. The app augments the TfB award winning online Service Information Centre, a special website that incorporates live data feeds from Masternaut's real-time vehicle tracking and mobile service management software

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • ITS needs data highways
    November 18, 2014
    Transport and traffic data is on the increase but there must be an integrated data highway to derive the maximum ITS benefits, argues Deutsche Telekom. From public transport operators recording increasingly precise and comprehensive data on their vehicle’s position and driving behaviour to local authorities using RFID and video systems to control traffic on their streets and highways, the amount of traffic data is growing rapidly.
  • Oslo tackles dumped e-scooters
    August 13, 2020
    Move comes as micromobility firm Voi calls for greater industry action
  • Mega trends will challenge transport technology
    June 5, 2015
    Jon Masters investigates some of the longer term trends that will shape transportation over the next 20 years. Business analysts and investors have already placed their bets on a future of technological smart mobility services. In December last year, the Wall Street Journal reported that Uber, the on-demand taxi and lift share smartphone app and start-up business, had been valued at $41.2 billion which, as the Journal reported, is an incredible vote of confidence for a company only five years old.
  • Managing congestion, better information changes perceptions
    January 31, 2012
    Kapsch's Dietrich Leihs talks about the true fundamentals of urban pricing. In some Italian and German towns and cities, the solution to congestion is an outright ban on certain types of vehicles. As far as Dietrich Leihs is concerned, any attempt to sweeten the pill that is congestion charging is only ever going to be a partial success at best.