CTS Worldwide Communications Director Martin Howell
David Crawford investigates a far reaching initiative in integrated travel
The Port Authority Transit Corporation (PATCO), an operator of high speed commuter rail in the north eastern US, is not one of the world's best known transit providers. Its 13 stations along a single east-west route (three of them interchanges with other regional commuter lines) handle 40,000 passengers a day, travelling to and from Philadelphia, the US' fifth most populous city.But PATCO has earned a place in the history of innovative ITS deployment in public transport. It has joined forces with San Diego headquartered automatic fare collection (AFC) specialist
The project involves a branded, open loop prepaid Visa card valid for both fare payments and retail purchases. The company is working on another similar open loop card payment system due for delivery through an $84M contract for the Greater Vancouver transit authority
CTS sees the PATCO pilot as a first as a practical step towards realising the ultimate goal of its Nextcity concept - an integrated, multi-modal urban travel payment and information array - that was first unveiled at the 2011 International Association of Public Transport World Congress in Dubai. The end result, CTS believes, will be a more rational way of regulating, planning and informing all modes of travel within a region, by mining and making use of payment derived data on transport users' movements and travel choices.
It sees the full deployment of Nextcity emerging in stages through a progressive evolution of the company's existing Nextfare AFC and Nextaccount platforms - the first realisation of the latter being PATCO's 'wave and pay' Anywhere card.
One advantage of this new approach for transit is that the financial risk shifts from the transit operators to the financial institutions - in exchange for a fee.
Speaking at the launch of Anywhere, CTS Worldwide president Steve Shewmaker highlighted it as a low fee product, planned to "assist transit agencies that are facing shrinking budgets and looking for ways to reduce the costs of fare card operations and to create avenues for additional revenues".
The initiative represents a step change from the existing closed loop PATCO Freedom card, which is only valid for fare payments. Passengers in the Philadelphia/New Jersey region that PATCO serves can use their reloadable Anywhere card at PATCO station gatelines and parking terminals, as well as for purchases of goods or services for which Visa debit cards are accepted.
Telephone calls, cash back at stores, ATM withdrawals, online purchases and bill payments - all can be made using the Anywhere card.
Card readers
The scheme uses CTS' contactless Tri- Reader (TR3) validating equipment. Developed by the company forIn October 2011, CTS won formal approval from card issuers American Express, MasterCard, Visa and the largely US-centred Discover, for the TR3 to process their EMV cards for use in public transit revenue management. It can also concurrently support multiple card schemes such as TfL's Oyster and those that meet the technical interoperability standards developed by UK based smart payment gatekeeper ITSO to support seamless travel throughout the country and, more widely, across Europe.
CTS took over as prime contractor for TfL's Oystercard in August 2010, with a remit to extend the scheme both geographically and technologically. (TfL had already carried out trials of fare payment by bank cards and mobile phones; and CTS says its technology will also be able to support payments made with near field communications following trials in both Europe and the US). The TR3 is currently being rolled out on all 8000 buses operated in London for TfL, with completion scheduled for Spring 2012.
The city's Underground (metro) network will be next in line, after the 2012 Olympics and Paralympics are over.
TfL's wider introduction of bank card payment will follow the initial bus roll out.
Five UK mainline train operating companies have already adopted the TR3, as part of their franchising agreements.
On to Nextcity
PATCO
PATCO, with stations on both sides of the Delaware River, is an operation of the Delaware River Port Authority of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, a regional transportation agency that serves the populations of the south eastern part of the city of Philadelphia and the southern part of the state of New Jersey. The Delaware Valley, the US' fifth-largest metropolitan area, is home to six million people.
In turn, the data derived from recording and analysing fare payment patterns will allow road users and passengers to better manage their personal and business travel.
They will be able to access comprehensive dynamic travel information services to make informed choices of time and mode.
Other companies' concepts or initiatives have embodied the term 'city' in efforts to improve urban mobility. But the starting point for CTS is its experience in AFC, which accounts for the highest modal share of electronic payment for transport worldwide. The concept also acknowledges the critical role of transit in achieving modal shift away from private car use and so reducing congestion and emissions and attaining more environmentally balanced communities.
The company now wants to extend it to a 'whole of transport' context, in private as well as public sectors. It is therefore being explicit in including toll highways and electronic road charging schemes in the projected mix.
This means that toll concessionaires, as well as private rail and bus operators, could expect to see people being disincentivised from choosing to use their services - if only temporarily. (The most obvious example would be in response to a major incident, in the interests of securing better traffic movement overall).
CTS worldwide communications director Martin Howell told ITS International, the scheme could eventually cover taxis and private hire vehicles, cycle hire, ferries, electronic refuelling and long distance rail, while automatically taking account of concessions for school pupils or senior citizens, as well as private and commercial vehicles paying road user charges. (Nextcity envisages integration with existing road payment and information systems without the need to replace existing infrastructure).
One benefit he foresees is cities being able to operate highly flexible public transport fare structures, configurable to encourage off peak travel, without presenting the travelling public with an overkill of choices - a common problem on the UK's national rail network.
The passenger would be able to "set and forget", in expectation of being charged the right fare. There would be the capability to reward travellers for making optimal use of the available public transit network with free transfers or capped charges.
Other Nextcity components include Nextledger, which takes in data on journey transactions as output from Nextaccount, carries out any accounting and financial adjustments that may be needed and then connects with the banking system to authorise interagency transfers. Nextcontact will offer a web and smartphone enabled CRM platform including ticket sales, an integrated voice response call centre and a passenger information system with SMS capability.
Finally, Nextinfo will collect data in real time on passenger and road user movements to equip city governments and transport operators to plan realistically for the future. CTS expects to have most of these elements operational, at least on a trial basis, within the next three years.
One of three business segments of
