The UK Department for Transport (DfT) is working with mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) company Moovit to utilise the Bus Open Data Service (BODS), a central source of timetable, bus location, and fare data of every bus operator across England.
Operators are now committed to openly publishing and storing transport information in BODS’s standard format to provide passengers with the most precise and updated bus information.
With Moovit’s assistance, the BODS project from the DfT is standardising and openly publishing bus operator data so that passengers across England can better plan journeys down to the minute, know how much their bus ride will cost in advance, and save time waiting for buses.
It will also enable developers to add BODS’s information into existing or new apps and products designed to provide riders with everything they need to more easily plan and ride efficient and accurate journeys.
Moovit’s technical expertise is helping guide the DfT in making BODS information usable for MaaS platforms. The company is also working with local transport authorities to integrate their BODS data into the Moovit app, providing passengers with precise journey planning, fares, disruptions data, and real-time arrival information.
Moovit recently collaborated on a similar project with Transport for the North (TfN), a subnational transport body in England representing 20 local transport authorities, on TfN’s Open Data Hub – an initiative of TfN’s £150m Integrated and Smart Travel programme.
“This will significantly further the ability of BODS to digitally transform the delivery of bus services and, ultimately, the passenger experience,” said Meera Nayyar, head of passenger experience (buses and taxis) at the DfT.
“Moovit will help revolutionise the way in which the DfT, and other stakeholders, collect and analyse bus data, enabling us to identify network optimisations more easily and help us support operators in reporting their on-time performance statistics.”
Bus operators across England were legally required to provide timetable data by the end of 2020 and must provide fare, ticket and location data by January 2021. The regulations aim to boost passenger confidence, as well as help keep fares down via greater transparency across different operators.
As previously reported by CiTTi, Moovit was acquired by Intel in 2020. Its urban mobility apps currently serve over 930 million users in more than 3,400 cities across 112 countries.
