How placr.mobi is helping to open up Traveline

Jonathan RaperCEO, Placr

www.placr.co.uk

Placr- an open data company

• A ‘data-as-a-service’ company founded in 2008• Developer of APIs and supplier to app developers• Offer full access to all of London’s transport data

– Live departures, timetables, fares, station/stops info– Performance monitoring e.g. www.tube-radar.com

• Developer of Pearson Plug & Play API• TSB funding to work with Plymouth CityBus, Go

South Coast and Traveline SW• Aiming to build national apps/services

The experience of bus services

• Evolving from– Anonymous, supply-driven to…– Personalised and connected

• Expectations are rising– PF show ‘info at stop’ is 3rd

lowest performing KPI in survey– ‘Time waited’ dominates issues

with bus travel– Generation Y/Z expect ‘an app

for that’

Is real time information the solution?

• Yes…– Can reduce waiting time– Builds confidence in service– NextBuses API-> popular apps

• No!– Does not create a relationship with the customer– Does not manage communications about services– Bus cos are using social media, but have no ownership– Other issues: fares, ticketing, interchange

Need an engagement strategy

• Need apps & services that build ongoing relationships

• Not just a hand-held departure board app for every city in UK

• Best sales force is a satisfied customer

• Customers expect to hear from other customers

• Social media is the natural channel

Apps for engagement• Great user experience• Times- scheduled & live• Service updates• Two-way communication

– Customer feedback– Operator polling

• Crowd sourcing news• Audience analytics • Campaign responses

placr.mobi ecosystem

pla.cr

Social media aggregationActivity stream

Timetables & real-time

} Placr analyticsPerformance mapsComment tag clouds

{Service updatesCampaign newsFixMyTransport

Crowd updatesOpenStreetMapCouncil street team

2-way communicationCommentsOperator polling

Free HTML5 webappRuns on all smartphones

Post via Twitter

Timetables & real-time

• Timetables from Traveline/TfL• transportapi.com service• Hyperlinked timetables• Simple URL hierarchy on web

– mode/region/operator/route/pattern/in|out

• Geolocation lookup of nearest stops based on NaPTAN

• Nextbuses API for real-time

UK TravelOptions

pla.cr• Repository & API for all UK route & stop activity• Being built at speed of input from partner sources

– Operator service updates via web, social media– Passenger comments via social media– Campaign updates via web eg FixMyTransport– Performance data from transportapi.com

• Have implemented comment filtering!

Service updates• Operator service updates going into social media• Access to content is according to Facebook T&C’s• pla.cr takes a local copy of updates & archives it• placr.mobi shows updates in the activity stream

Crowd updating

• Many stop facilities are unknown• Conditions at stops change• Data gathering by passengers

supported into the app• placr.mobi gathers updates and

submits to operator/ OSM

Two-way communication

• Customer feedback– Activity streams report feedback

• Mobile polling– placr.mobi offers polling tools in

activity streams– Results are aggregated for

operators

Placr analytics• Performance maps for live running eg tube-radar• Local social media searching eg bus+driver in LDN• Volume of comments to services by hour/day etc

Business model

Analytics

Integration withOther data feeds

API

Free apps

£££

Developers

Ads

Fees

Customerrelationship

Compilation,referencing &validation

Delivery of dataas-a-service

Raw timetable &Real time data

Updates,comments

Open data and Traveline• Apps can deliver value to passengers & operators• placr.mobi can ONLY realise this value now due to

– Availability of open timetables and Nextbuses API– zero open data costs: app margins are small– Accessible licensing conditions

• placr.mobi is deployed in London, SW Traveline• We are looking to partner with Traveline Regions,

bus companies to expand market• We believe placr.mobi provides business cases to

open up Traveline data

Contact

http://www.placr.co.ukjonathan.raper@placr.co.uk@madprof

These slides are athttp://www.slideshare.net/MadProf/