The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Display boards to make wait for bus less stressful

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Jul 15, 2006

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Display boards to make wait for bus less stressful

Anil Kumar Sastry

BMTC adopting GPS and GIS in a big way to track buses

USEFUL: The display board installed at the Shivajinagar Bus Station in Bangalore. — Photo: Sampath Kumar G.P.

BANGALORE: Waiting for route no. 36 at corporation bus stop at 6 p.m. and wondering when the bus would arrive? The Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) is making an effort to make that waiting a little easier with its proposal to put up display boards at every bus stop.

This is how BMTC aims at the maximum exploitation of the global positioning system (GPS) and the geographical information system (GIS) for commuter comfort.

While GIS digitally maps the road network of the city, GPS enables tracking of the vehicle and its exact location at the given point of time with the help of a satellite.

As a first step towards deploying GPS and GIS for real-time passenger information system (RPIS), the corporation has set up electronic display boards on two platforms at Kempe Gowda Bus Station on platform 3 (Chandra Layout, Nagarbhavi and so on) and platform 11 (Banashankari, J.P. Nagar and so on) and one each at Shivajinagar Bus Station (platform 3) and Shanthinagar Bus Station (platform 11) on a trial basis.

At present, the information regarding arrival and departure of buses is stored in the display board itself with necessary memory space. The information is shown every 10 seconds with the help of a processor, necessary software and a real-time clock.

BMTC Director (Security and Vigilance) P.S. Sandhu told The Hindu that although a normal electronic board, it was GPS-enabled. Once the BMTC deployed real-time GPS, the display boards would be able to show the departure and arrival of buses accurately.

As of now, BMTC has fitted GPS equipment on 700 of its own buses and 350 hired buses. Now, it is being used to track the movement of hired vehicles and the data is retrieved once in four hours. Shortly, 1,500 more BMTC buses would get GPS equipment, he said.

Mr. Sandhu said the process of deploying GPS on a full-scale was going on. Once the technical specifications were finalised, the corporation would invite tenders. Deployment of GPS was integrated with automated fare collection system thereby enabling the corporation to get information online about traffic revenue collection, volume of traffic and so on, he said.After the full-scale deployment of GPS, the RPIS would be in place in three major bus stations, initially. It would be extended to minor bus stations and bus shelters in a phased manner, Mr. Sandhu said.

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