Practical Case Study: Mobile Phone Passenger Support Apps

Even for fully able travellers, an emotional inertia can be present when facing making a multimodal public transport journey.  Examples can include passengers’ perception of:

• Services as crowded or unreliable and not understanding the timetable, where the stops are or how to transfer from one service to another.
• Complex stations (especially with Rail interchanges), subways, escalators and platforms with a variety of connecting public transport services.
• A lack of live status information of services cancelled at short notice, can manifest as a perceived lack of a dependable service.
• Understanding of confusing and complicated ticketing and timetabling for the different services across all modes of transport.
  For people with disabilities the issues are amplified with examples of further issues being:
• Location of public conveniences and the availability of accessible services.
• Location and negotiation of escalators.
• How to get to and where to locate yourself on a platform to access the service vehicle to enable easy access for your needs, as well as knowing when and where to get on and off the vehicle when in transit.
• How to get through or around crowds or heavy passenger volumes.

The benefits of removing these barriers would result in greater public acceptance and use of transport. Able bodied passengers will be able to better engage with public transport. Disabled passengers will be able to travel unaided, making Transport a much more accessible means of travel.

The essential formula to trigger a greater uptake of integrated public transport includes elements of familiarity, personal confidence, reliable outcomes, affordability, good use of time and comfort.  

Mobile and wireless based technologies offer considerable potential for universal (mode, location and individual) support to make integrated public transportation a more attractive choice.  Integrated Transport is one of the 5 key priorities declared by the secretary of state in July 2024 ( Transport Secretary sets out 5 key priorities to deliver the biggest overhaul to transport in a generation - GOV.UK  ). Even with enthusiastic up-take of digital solutions for enhanced multimodal journey support, success will only be assured if all transport operators commit to support, in the knowledge that their own business will grow because of greater passenger numbers.

This assumes good connectivity is available. Applications are listed in categories below:

• Timetable and routes information – examples being National Rail, Trainline, Moovit and Google maps which all have a slightly different capability with Google providing a full end to end journey capability.
• Accessibility – Wheelmaps, Access Earth, LDN Access providing information about accessibility and facilities aimed at passengers with disabilities.
• Sight and hearing support – Be my eyes, Roger Voice, Blindsquare, Google Live Transcribe and Icomera’s Passenger experience platform, providing in App voice or vision enhancements and information to aid environment interactions.

One of the most comprehensive services developed so far which builds on their connectivity solutions on board transport vehicles is provided by ICOMERA, who have contributed to the insights provided through this document. 

GoMedia / Icomera have a real time “Passenger Information system” and on-board transport entertainment portal “Go view”. They have recently added a “passenger feedback and Sentiment analysis” service to help capture feedback from passengers, helping to raise awareness of service issues. A new addition to the platform is the “Transport Accessibility” solution which has recently been trialled on Rail. 

The Accessibility platform assists partially sighted and people with hearing impairments. It accesses live journey, facilities and onward journey information with on-board or station announcements available in either text or audio. 

The solution can be extended to help people with hearing impairment by including British Sign Language as a visual display which includes automated announcements, for example communicating delay and cancellation messages. 

To help partially sighted people, the addition of colourful and easy to identify QR codes are located in the transport environment in both stations and on vehicle. These can easily be scanned by the mobile phone to locate the user, with wayfinding instructions communicated to the passenger, providing directions at transport intersections or while on board the vehicle. 

This combined functionality allows everyone, including blind and partially sighted people to navigate around the public transport network safely. These accessibility solutions have been signed off and approved by the Royal National Institute of Blind people (RNIB), and the Royal National Institute of Deaf people (RNID).

While both solutions have a fall back to offline support, live and continuous connectivity is needed to keep users updated about the latest status of their journey. For example, if a route is selected for navigation, the passenger can carry on navigation if there is no connectivity, but if there are platform changes then the route can’t be automatically updated. The same if there is no connectivity and you want to start a route. The passenger can see the most important destinations and navigate there but can’t access routing based on live journey information.

The same works for sign language support or announcements support in general. If no connectivity is present, no new information can be pulled in if there are any changes to existing journey information. For sign language it is even more important to have continuous connectivity because the AI model to generate the sign language translation is in the cloud.

Connectivity to the passenger’s mobile phone can be provided through their own cellular connection to public mobile networks or through Wi-Fi systems on board transport vehicles or available at stations. It is worth noting that Wifi still relies on cellular connectivity on board a vehicle to function.

The system has several levels of safety build in, mainly from a user point of view to make sure that partially sighted people don’t navigate to dangerous places or wrong information is given.

In order to progress passenger supportive digital Apps the following are actions suggested:

• Create a long-term connectivity investment plan to upgrade to ensure good connectivity at Rail and Bus interchanges and any future Transport mobility hub. This should be led by DfT.
• Support testing and evaluation of digital App solutions across all modes of transport with operator and passenger inputs to refine the business cases and user functionality. This should include all modes of transport and a cross transport supportive trial environment building on trial locations previously used. This should be led by DfT and Transport operators.
• Investigate how to promote cross operator and cross Transport mode adoption of core Apps, supporting people with disabilities in particular, to ensure commonality and safety in adoption for a passenger full journey. This should be led by DfT.

Common standards for data access and best practice for user interfaces would support future Apps being compatible with each other and enable combination of functionality where applicable. Promote a common set of mobile phone and digital Apps which are compatible with operators’ data platforms and an investment plan to rollout supportive digital Apps to make Transport more accessible across the UK led by DfT and Transport operators.

ICOMERA Travel App 

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Passenger surveys are conducted at regular times in a year (typically once or twice) by Transport Focus, an independent watchdog sponsored by DfT. These surveys capture a sample of user data to represent customer satisfaction. Passenger satisfaction includes disabled users.

Making Transport more accessible to disabled passengers will Increase revenue for the public transport operators due to people being able to make transport journeys independently. The reliance on taxis and cars will also be reduced, helping with traffic congestion and positively impacting on CO2 reduction.

Bringing sign language to people’s own mobile devices is cheaper than physical screens in transport infra structure and vehicles and is also more scalable. In addition, this functionality on a personal mobile phone provides the user with confidence from the point of leaving home to arriving at the destination, as it is readily available for reference. 

The ICOMERA solution described is offered as a Software as a Service Model with an up front fee for development and then an ongoing license and management fee. 

Market acceptance and Passenger acceptance tests are recommended for any location or mode of transport considering these digital App solutions, to align need with the functionality offered.  

There are significant benefits of scaling a digital product such as the ICOMERA solution designed to operate on a selection of Trains stations for example, as there are relatively small incremental costs to implement at multiple locations across a full transport route. The main development has already taken place to develop the Apps working on board the vehicle and in the transport hub.

Improved social value is generated by the operator’s business as well as local government as plans are progressed for better public transport with improved accessibility for all residents.

 

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Source DWP, Family resources Survey 2022/23

From the Icomera trials (held on West Midlands Metro Tram and the Transports Metropolitans in Barcelona) 88% of people found the guidance for partially sighted people was very useful on Transport. The Functionality for hearing impaired people also achieved over 80% acceptance for independent travel when tested in London with TfL.

Digital support Apps such as these will also help young and older people who may need help with timetabling, ticketing and detailed guidance, providing the ingredients for confidence to travel.

Inclusive and accessible travel is important for Local Authorities to support their communities to be able to get to and from work, socialise, go shopping or deal with personal or family healthcare requirements. The input from first responders will also be reduced as a result of independent and safe travel for all, especially when there is disruption to Transport services.

The ability to capture Passenger feedback & safety information while travelling in real time, including Anti-social behaviour, and welfare information is important to promote and support confidence while travelling on public transport. 

Passenger surveys are currently carried out at set times during the year which although useful, does not provide regular or real-time feedback to transport operators so they can react to changing circumstances. Regular feedback through digital Apps provides the opportunity to capture and act on real time data. 

Passenger journey planning, especially across multimode public transport can be challenging even for the experienced passenger, especially when things go wrong and alternative transport solutions are needed due to travel delays, breakdowns or cancellations. The ability to locate alternative transport hubs or stops is not always simple, especially for passengers caught in unfamiliar locations.

Transport is becoming more complex, as more options are available with the inclusion of active travel. The integration of these alternative modes of transport to a user’s journey is a further challenge to support greener cities of the future, such as London and Birmingham’s big city plans.

Passenger support Apps used in transport hubs and stations introduce the opportunity to contact and inform transport operator staff. Aligning staff movement to best serve the needs of the individual passenger provides a powerful opportunity to improve customer service and really enhance the passenger journey. This will also inform the operator and enable ongoing improvements. 

Finally, the digital Apps support for individuals should decrease the need for operator staff input overall and if successful, increased passenger numbers can be assisted without the need to increase staff numbers.

Different levels of improving access and functionality can be selected to suit the user’s needs and desire.  A comprehensive functionality including the full suite of support for the passenger from full end to end wayfinding, to only certain travel information is key to adoption and on-going use. 

Trialling with smaller operators such as local bus services or Tram service providers can provide a very good and flexible support needed to develop and modify the hardware and software without the complexity of engaging initially with large Rail or Bus operators. The Connected Places Catapult have a live RAIL trial station in Bristol Temple Meads and WM5G provided a collaboration with West Midlands Metro using TRAMS for trials held in 2020-2022.

On going costs to maintain as well as the initial costs to develop should be considered as the Transport industry is very cost sensitive. Avoid getting locked in to one operator as the wider benefit to passengers is an App which is available at all times across all operators and transport modes.

Support Apps such as these should be developed in a way that can be migrated easily between Transport operators using standard API’s and meet user and cyber security protocols which are constantly evolving. Best practice cyber security involves designing security in from the beginning of a concept and seeking expert input where required as well as conducting detailed penetration testing.