Skip to main content

Launch of the Assistant project

The European Assistant (Aiding SuStainable Independent Senior TrAvellers to Navigate in Towns) project which will develop an ICT application to help older people to make unfamiliar trips on public transport has been launched. The three year project will develop an application for the home PC and smartphone that will be designed to help older travellers plan their public transport journeys and then receive guidance during their journey. This guidance will help them to find the bus that they need, warn them w
July 24, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
RSSThe European Assistant (Aiding SuStainable Independent Senior TrAvellers to Navigate in Towns) project which will develop an ICT application to help older people to make unfamiliar trips on public transport has been launched. The three year project will develop an application for the home PC and smartphone that will be designed to help older travellers plan their public transport journeys and then receive guidance during their journey. This guidance will help them to find the bus that they need, warn them when to get off the bus, when and where to change to another route, and will also provide assistance if something goes wrong.

The application will be designed to help users who are unfamiliar with the local public transport system either because they are visiting somewhere that they do not know well, or because they are beginning to use public transport again after losing the ability to drive. It will also offer help with the difficult last mile of a journey from the point at which you get off public transport to your final destination.

The project involves eight partners from five countries with an overall cost of €2.7 million (US$3.27 million). It is a project that is supported by the Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) Joint Programme, which is funded by the 1690 European Commission and the National Contact Points for the AAL programme in each partner’s country. The Assistant application is expected to come to market by 2017.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Investing in ITS: Show us the money
    April 8, 2022
    The ITS industry is currently attracting a lot of interest from private equity and venture capital providers. Adam Hill asks some of the people who have their eyes on the market what makes it such a good bet
  • Platform announcement: public transport is running 10 years behind schedule
    March 10, 2023
    Public transport worldwide is under pressure on a variety of fronts. Jon Salmon of Snapper Services UK explains why the industry should look more at data – and pick up some tips from the retail sector
  • Leading Finland’s transport revolution
    July 18, 2017
    Anne Berner, Finland’s minister of transport and communications, does not fit the normal political mould. She is not a career politician but a business executive who became a member of parliament in 2015 and has said from the outset that she will only serve one term. Without concerns about being re-elected and a clear view of the future of transport, Berner can concentrate on what needs to be done - tackling some of the more contentious and intransigent subjects. Her name is best known for two major initiat
  • Australian road pricing, road funding needs more debate
    January 31, 2012
    Everyone in the road transport industry in Australia is talking road pricing - everyone, that is, except the politicians. Christine Keyes reports. At the end of 2008, Australia's road transport industry was wringing its collective hands, unable to raise more than $100 million from an individual bank for any Public Private Partnership (PPP). The A$750 million Peninsula Link project, announced by the Victoria Government in March 2009, was the first road project in the country to be put out to market as an ava