Skip to main content

Tri Met and Google team up to trial virtual public transit card

Portland’s Tri-County Metropolitan Transportation District (TriMet) has joined forces with Google to create a virtual public transit card via Android Pay. It allows riders to tap and pay their transit fare using a virtual Hop Card stored in their smartphone with Near Field Communication. The service expected to be available to users in the early part of next year following the beta launch in December 2017. Innovations in Transportation’s (INIT’s) back-end processing system, Mobilevario, serves as the
December 14, 2017 Read time: 2 mins

Portland’s Tri-County Metropolitan Transportation District (1272 TriMet) has joined forces with Google to create a virtual public transit card via Android Pay. It allows riders to tap and pay their transit fare using a virtual Hop Card stored in their smartphone with Near Field Communication. The service expected to be available to users in the early part of next year following the beta launch in December 2017. 

Innovations in Transportation’s (INIT’s) back-end processing system, Mobilevario, serves as the core intelligence for the project and processes all forms of payment for the multi-agency system.

TriMet riders can tap their device to any of INIT’s 1,200 Proxmobil validators, Mobilevario calculates the fare, validates the transaction against the back-office account, and displays the result in real-time. It is said to provide accurate and up to date account information at any time.

Hot Fast Pass has been designed with an open architecture approach which allowed more than a dozen partners associated with the project to be integrated without changes to the core system.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Developments in travel information display systems
    August 1, 2012
    David Crawford looks at recent developments in travel information display systems. It is important to remember that we are investing in Real-Time Passenger Information [RTPI] to increase ridership," says Robert Burke, Managing Director of New Zealand transit tracking technology specialist Connexionz, which has been involved in at-stop and remote passenger information since 1995. "Superior information improves the perception of public transport reliability and gives the passenger more choices and greater con
  • Moovit creates Israel MaaS movement
    December 30, 2020
    Firm partners with Pango to give public transport users single planning and payment option
  • Smartphone - the next technology for charging and tolling?
    January 25, 2012
    With all the debates over the most suitable future technology or technologies for charging and tolling, is it not time for the industry to look at what the rest of ITS is doing and bring a rank outsider - the smart phone - closer into the fold? By Jack Opiola, D'Artagnan Consulting LLC
  • Florida's free flow tolling eases congestion, improves safety
    July 24, 2012
    A decade since Florida's Turnpike Enterprise first deployed electronic toll collection, the organisation's Director of Toll Operations Rick Nelson and Tom S. Knuckey of PBS&J look at progress. A decade on from the deployment of Florida's Turnpike Enterprise's state-wide SunPass pre-paid Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) programme, transponder sales have ballooned from 5,000 to more than 4,000,000. Over 70 per cent of the state's turnpike drivers participate in the system and transponder sales continue to gro