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unimaginative2

unimaginative2

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The screens will be provided by OneStop, and they will have minimal advertising. The TTC is implementing new screens to replace the ones in the subway, and they could spread around the city as part of the Next Bus Arrival system. Finch Station will be the pilot project.

I really hope that the TTC is buying a bus tracking system off the shelf, and not trying to re-invent the wheel like they did with CIS.

http://www.ttc.ca/postings/gso-comrpt/documents/report/f3499/PROCUREMENT_AUTHORIZATION_AMENDMENT_-_ONESTOP_MEDIA_GROUP_PROPOSAL_-_NEXT_BUS_ARRIVAL_SCREENS.pdf
 
I saw it today at TTC meeting and a step in the right direction.

It show all the Finch line as individual lines with major intersection east of Finch showing where the bus are as well how long until they arrives at the station.

It great knowing when a Finch bus will arrive, but it does not tell you if that bus is going to change to another route number for departure as well when it will depart.

Many issues where raise surrounding the screen layout as well providing info to riders as to delays on the routes.

Once the info is posted on the screen as to delays or detours, it will be posted to the website as well email to riders who use the route.

The video screens will be OneStop for the terminals, but all other locations will be done under a full tender process, not the sole sources today.

Fonts and size need to be larger.

If I had my camera with me, I would had taken a picture. It was in for repairs.

Testing will start in November with CIS doing some work in house to prepare for it until then that will affect the system 100%.
 
How would the screens work? Updated dynamically given the location of the actual bus, or off of a schedule? If the latter, it's just a gimmick. It might also be nice to have distance, rather than just time...
 
Yeah, distances are much more useful on routes that have any kind of unreliability. But with exceptions...Distances for Spadina streetcars: 1.8km, 1.8km, 1.8km, 1.8km, 3km, 3km, 3km, 3km, etc. won't help.

Finch East is possibly the one route in the entire city where next bus screens aren't useful...I've never waited more than 10 minutes for a Finch bus. The frequency is very comforting.
 
afransen said:
How would the screens work? Updated dynamically given the location of the actual bus, or off of a schedule? If the latter, it's just a gimmick. It might also be nice to have distance, rather than just time...
Click to expand...

Considering they currently use GPS for the next stop is system on the buses, I imagine it wouldnt be that hard to get dynamically updated screens.
 
NextBus Beta Shows Toronto Streetcar Network

Not sure how reliable the data is, but at NextBus you can now follow your favourite streetcar route live. Looks promising, although it's not too hot aesthetically.
 
Up here in Thunder Bay, it is used, and it is very accurate.

It might not look that hot, but it gets the job done.
 
Sad, they don't have TTC set up for SMS alerts yet but I'm sure it's coming.

These people just made my life that much better. :)
 
Update From http://spacing.ca/wire/:

Some of our readers will have already read my post from early this morning (around 2am) when Spacing got word that the TTC’s GPS tracking system had a “live†web feed (still in beta testing mode) to let riders know the next arrival time of a streetcar.

But Spacing received word from the TTC this afternoon that Next Bus, the company providing the GPS tracker, is going to disable the arrival time feeds for all routes except for the Spadina 510 and the Harbourfront 509 streetcars. The TTC said all other routes are not GPS-to-web enabled. Next Bus is only providing estimated times on the other routes since the info is being pulled from the schedule and not the location of the nearest streetcar. The TTC said Next Bus does not want to provide information to the public that is not yet reliable. Give them credit, though, for not disabling the entire feed and allowing the public to “experiment†with the accurate info from the 509 and 510 routes.

For those of us who were using the Next Bus web site this morning and finding it to be accurate: we were slightly fooled. It just meant that the TTC streetcars were running on time according to their schedule. Which, unto itself, is refreshing.
 
What we saw this morning clearly wasn't from the schedule. On the 506 route during late rush-hour, it shows next cars with intervals like 1 min, 1 min, 12 min; 7 min, 8 min, 8 min, .... and on the fringes of 501, there were times like 32 min to the next car.

This was real data. The arrival times at future stops matched the locations shown for the vehicles displayed. And the displayed vehicles matched what was passing my door - even when clustered.

I can see that they would want to keep the data out of public hands, while it is incomplete, as it will only lead to complaints about large gaps between cars. But they data was clearly real.
 
This is great technology, but it makes managing PR for the TTC all the more difficult. When the next streetcar arrives is generally just guess work right now -- it's rarely precisely quantified. If suddenly it becomes factually clear that people are waiting 45 minutes to an hour for a 501 car in the middle of the day, how is the TTC going to justify that as an acceptable level of service?

The NextBus stuff is totally cool, though. I wish they'd hire a graphic design team to not make it look terrible, but the technology is long overdue and much appreciated.
 
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