Skip to main content

Melbourne buses to get bus tracking system

Public Transport Victoria (PTV) in Australia has opted for Smartrak as the preferred supplier to operate the bus tracking system (BTS) for metropolitan buses. PTV chief executive officer Mark Wild said that the award of this contract is another step forward in providing better and real-time information, as well as improved bus services for our customers. It also paves the way for the provision of real time bus tracking information via smartphone apps, online and PTV’s customer contact centre. The new
March 31, 2014 Read time: 2 mins
RSSPublic Transport Victoria (PTV) in Australia has opted for Smartrak as the preferred supplier to operate the bus tracking system (BTS) for metropolitan buses.

PTV chief executive officer Mark Wild said that the award of this contract is another step forward in providing better and real-time information, as well as improved bus services for our customers. It also paves the way for the provision of real time bus tracking information via smartphone apps, online and PTV’s customer contact centre.

The new bus tracking system will be rolled out to all bus depots by the end of the 2014 financial year, with customer benefits progressively implemented once the system roll-out is completed. Smartrak will operate the bus tracking system for five years, with an option to extend its term for up to five years.

“The metropolitan bus network carries 119.3 million passengers a year and the roll-out of the bus tracking system to the rest of the bus fleet will give customers greater confidence to use the bus network,” Mr Wild said.

“Smartrak has a proven track record in providing accurate and reliable real-time public transport solutions to help organisations like PTV increase the performance of passenger information systems, which is fantastic news for PTV’s customers.

He said that, once in operation, the system will provide accurate, detailed and timely service information available shortly, leading to improved coordination at transport interchanges helping customers to interchange between trains, trams and buses, enhanced operational management capabilities for PTV and bus operators, as well as helping to support decision making for bus service improvements, such as where bus lanes or priority traffic light signals could improve services.

Related Content

  • May 27, 2014
    Connecticut Transit uses web feedback to improve user experience
    Connecticut champions open government and open data to help fostertransparency, accountability and citizen engagement – and that includes transportation matters as Andrew Bardin Williams discovers. The last thing anyone wanted was to inconvenience or displace others - least of all people who lived and worked in the neighbourhood. Yet, workers in an office building in downtown New Haven, Conn., were tired of shuffling through hoards of people who kept sitting on the stoop to the building while waiting for th
  • April 10, 2014
    Columbia goes intermodal to support sustainability
    David Crawford on the ups and downs of a Latin metropolis. Medellín, Colombia’s second city and a recognised leader in sustainable transport thinking, is rapidly extending its substantial existing investment in modern mobility. It is deploying both an enhanced integrated traffic management array and the country’s first intermodal public transportation management system. The supplier of both, under separate €9 million (US$12.3 million) contracts, is Spanish engineering company Indra, a major exporter
  • May 7, 2014
    Underground DART plan back on track
    Irish Rail is set to proceed with the US$2.8 billion underground second DART rail line through the heart of Dublin city centre, following a recent High Court decision which gave the green light for the project. The line, which would run from Docklands to Inchicore, would complete the trebling of the Greater Dublin area's rail service capacity from 33 million passenger journeys annually now to 100 million passenger journeys upon completion.
  • March 10, 2015
    Alstom consortiums awarded contracts for Cairo metro line 3
    Alstom has signed two contracts with Egypt’s National Authority for Tunnels (NAT) to supply the signalling system in a consortium with Thales and, in partnership with Colas Rail, Orascom and ARABCO, the infrastructure of the phase 4A of Cairo metro line 3, currently under construction. Alstom’s shares in these contracts are worth around US$96 million. Cairo’s metro currently carries three million passengers per day and this is expected to reach five million by 2020. Its network includes two fully operationa