NICE buses to add arrival tracking system

[Orion VII 4 Life]

Clever Devices has been picked for the new tracking system.

 

Nassau County Upgrading All NICE Buses

With New Communications Technology

 

Multi-Million Dollar Contract for “Intelligent Transportation System”

Featuring Integrated Communications, Control, Monitoring and

Management Systems to Replace Current Outdated System;

Paid for with Federal, State and County Grants

 

 

Nassau Inter-County Express (NICE bus) has signed a multi-million dollar contract with a Woodbury-based company to install a comprehensive advanced GPS-based “intelligent transportation system” on all its buses that will offer numerous integrated features designed to improve the rider experience and enhance operational performance.

 

The new NICE Integrated System (NIS) will be installed on NICE’s entire fleet of 300 fixed-route buses, replacing antiquated systems that date back to 1998 currently on most of the buses. The core of the NIS are Computer-Aided Dispatch and Automatic Vehicle Location systems that offer dozens of features and benefits that do not currently exist or function on NICE’s buses.

 

“We are pleased to be revamping the NICE fleet with state-of-the-art technology that will offer many benefits to our riders,” said Nassau County Executive Edward P. Mangano. “We are especially pleased that a growing, innovative Nassau County company was selected through a competitive proposal process.” The contract was awarded to Clever Devices, a Woodbury-based company whose technology solutions for public transportation are in use in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Pennsylvania and many other states.

 

NIS is designed to provide convenient real-time and reliable bus information and announcements to riders, including automated onboard systems for auditory and visual stop announcements, as well as improved information at transit centers. The new system will allow riders to plan their trips with information available on their smart phones and other devices.

 

NIS offers many monitoring and control features that will make it possible to improve system performance, such as improving on-time performance, relieving overcrowding and bunching of buses, and detecting maintenance issues and bus breakdowns. NIS will also improve communications between bus operators and NICE’s central command center, help track customer complaints and issues, collect accurate data that is valuable in system planning, help re-route buses because of road conditions, offer training tools, and many other features.

 

“For some months, NICE has been carefully reviewing how we can install a new system that offers the advanced functionality to provide greatest benefits to our customer and the most useful management features, all with the greatest reliability at the best price,” said NICE Chief Executive Officer Mike Setzer. “We think our focus on defining what we want the system to deliver will pay off once it is installed.”

 

NICE spent a number of months preparing the specifications for the system and going through a Request for Proposal process. The new system is currently under design and is expected to be operating by the end of 2014. It will be paid for with an 80 percent grant from the Federal Transit Administration, with the remainder coming from New York State and Nassau County.

They were bound to get the award. They're Nassau based, plus you got the new IVN3 (GPS based, color touch screen for the driver and new announcements) system on the 3Gs already factory installed, which you can now expect to be expanded to the rest of the fleet.

 

Very good news to see the Clever Devices BusTime product getting more business (we have it in NJ and it's absolutely great), and this is great for the NICE operation and customers as well.

[QM1to6Ave]

As nice as these GPS systems are, I wonder if the grants would be better spent paying more B/O's or buying more buses so that you have more runs, even if you do not have a fancy tracking system. 

[Orion VII 4 Life]

As nice as these GPS systems are, I wonder if the grants would be better spent paying more B/O's or buying more buses so that you have more runs, even if you do not have a fancy tracking system.

Having the ability to see where your bus is increases ridership.

 

You also gotta remember that the CleverCAD system being introduced helps dispatchers see where the buses are and keep them on time

[N6 Limited]

As nice as these GPS systems are, I wonder if the grants would be better spent paying more B/O's or buying more buses so that you have more runs, even if you do not have a fancy tracking system. 

I'd prefer to see where the bus is.

 

Having the ability to see where your bus is increases ridership.

 

You also gotta remember that the CleverCAD system being introduced helps dispatchers see where the buses are and keep them on time

Whats "Transfer connection protection"?

http://www.cleverdevices.com/clever-devices-products-computer-aided-dispatch.htm

[Vistausss]

Yeah, seeing where your bus will absolutely be great! If only we had something like that here... Anyway, Clever Devices does a good job so I'm happy to see they got the award

[Orion VII 4 Life]

Whats "Transfer connection protection"?

http://www.cleverdevices.com/clever-devices-products-computer-aided-dispatch.htm

Could be automatically holding up a certain bus to allow trransferring pax from another line to get on.

[QM1to6Ave]

Having the ability to see where your bus is increases ridership.

 

You also gotta remember that the CleverCAD system being introduced helps dispatchers see where the buses are and keep them on time

 

I guess...perhaps I am old fashioned, but I'm not so impressed with the GPS. In a perfect world, if there were ample buses and B/O's, everything would run on time and the GPS wouldn't be necessary. But I do understand why it is helpful (especially for off-peak buses)

[N6 Limited]

I guess...perhaps I am old fashioned, but I'm not so impressed with the GPS. In a perfect world, if there were ample buses and B/O's, everything would run on time and the GPS wouldn't be necessary. But I do understand why it is helpful (especially for off-peak buses)

Knowing where the bus is lets you know if you should rush to the bus stop or not, if you have time to stop by the store or take your time eating at the restaurant, allow you to pinpoint certain rush hour buses that may be less crowded, allows you to see if you may make your connection, help you decide if you should wait for a bus, or just walk to the route/stop you want to connect to (if you're close enough), if the express bus is catching up to your bus and whether you should transfer, etc.

 

I just hope the map is mobile friendly,(Like an app). The MTA Bus time site map on cellphones sucks, and I don't like the mobile pages indicating how many stops away a bus is I don't care how many stops away it is, I want a visual.Seeing the bus move, move slowly, being stationary helps, you can see if the bus is held up, is in traffic, or is making good progress. Saying a bus is 4 stops away really means nothing.

[Vistausss]

Plus Bus Time is also convenient when waiting for a delayed bus. I mean, you could be waiting at the bus stop and you think "where the frick is my bus? it was supposed to be here 5 min ago". With systems like here you don't get much more than "bus is delayed" but with Bus Time you can actually look where exactly it is delayed. It makes the waiting at the bus stop more convenient if you know where the bus got stuck (and how far off that is).

[QM1to6Ave]

Knowing where the bus is lets you know if you should rush to the bus stop or not, if you have time to stop by the store or take your time eating at the restaurant, allow you to pinpoint certain rush hour buses that may be less crowded, allows you to see if you may make your connection, help you decide if you should wait for a bus, or just walk to the route/stop you want to connect to (if you're close enough), if the express bus is catching up to your bus and whether you should transfer, etc.

 

I just hope the map is mobile friendly,(Like an app). The MTA Bus time site map on cellphones sucks, and I don't like the mobile pages indicating how many stops away a bus is I don't care how many stops away it is, I want a visual.Seeing the bus move, move slowly, being stationary helps, you can see if the bus is held up, is in traffic, or is making good progress. Saying a bus is 4 stops away really means nothing.

 

I agree that it can be very helpful. My experiences with MTA Bus Time, like yours, have been mixed. 

[bobtehpanda]

I find NICE arrival times at certain stops to be a lot more variable than at others, so this is certainly helpful. It pays to know the difference between your bus running two minutes early and your bus running two minutes late, particularly at the frequencies NICE runs at.

[Orion VII 4 Life]

Knowing where the bus is lets you know if you should rush to the bus stop or not, if you have time to stop by the store or take your time eating at the restaurant, allow you to pinpoint certain rush hour buses that may be less crowded, allows you to see if you may make your connection, help you decide if you should wait for a bus, or just walk to the route/stop you want to connect to (if you're close enough), if the express bus is catching up to your bus and whether you should transfer, etc.

 

I just hope the map is mobile friendly,(Like an app). The MTA Bus time site map on cellphones sucks, and I don't like the mobile pages indicating how many stops away a bus is I don't care how many stops away it is, I want a visual.Seeing the bus move, move slowly, being stationary helps, you can see if the bus is held up, is in traffic, or is making good progress. Saying a bus is 4 stops away really means nothing.

Clever Devices BusTime has a different interface, depending on how you look at it better or worse than MTA Bus Time. The interface sucks, but it gives you a (usually pretty damn accurate) ETA for the bus instead of the amount of stops away it is, one of the big things I really don't like about MTA Bus Time.

[Joel Up Front]

Clever Devices BusTime has a different interface, depending on how you look at it better or worse than MTA Bus Time. The interface sucks, but it gives you a (usually pretty damn accurate) ETA for the bus instead of the amount of stops away it is, one of the big things I really don't like about MTA Bus Time.

ETA based on stops doesn't always work.  Quite a few routes have up to half a mile between stops.

[Orion VII 4 Life]

ETA based on stops doesn't always work.  Quite a few routes have up to half a mile between stops.

I don't know what the mechanism is, but it works fine here. It had problems on 34th Street when it was demo'd with the MTA, but the whole product was brand-new at the time.

[Vistausss]

Well, in my experience and many others I know, both ETA based on stops and ETA based on GPS works like crap.

[Vistausss]

Damn, that is advanced! I'm really jealous you guys are getting such an advanced system. Although even the real-time information makes it more advanced than here (although we do have electronic signs at a growing number of stops but that's far from perfect or helpful). Let's hope TransDev brings some of it to Europe. I'm happy for you guys and way to go NICE, can't wait to see it in action!

[N6 Limited]

The same exact article is on a different site. Did they just post a press release from Violia?

 

http://www.masstransitmag.com/news/11228909/nice-bus-to-add-info-system

[Vistausss]

@N6l: I'm not sure where the news came from. I can't find any press release on the NICE website nor the Veolia website nor the Transdev website...

 

Edit: well, at least Mass Transit copied it from Newsday. Newsday's copyright is mentioned on the bottom of page 2 of the article.

[Orion VII 4 Life]

Here's a link to the Newsday video for everyone:

 

http://media.newsday.com/brightcove/Media/2014288409001/201311/2014288409001_2827078883001_110613matt-nice-bus-technology-rotkiewicz.mp4?videoId=2826924010001&lineUpId=&pubId=2014288409001&playerId=2045898129001&affiliateId=

Nice behind the scenes look at Clever.

[N6 Limited]

Their system in Chicago seems to be straight forward.. www.ctabustracker.com

[Orion VII 4 Life]

Their system in Chicago seems to be straight forward.. www.ctabustracker.com

And NJ as well, mybusnow.njtransit.com/bustime

[N6 Limited]

And NJ as well, mybusnow.njtransit.com/bustime

Which is especially helpful for NJT since there are no bus maps. The only thing is that you have to know specifically which route or stop you're looking for, which doesn't help if you want to see which routes serve a certain area or stop/station.