Centro improves its real time system support

A robust and secure Private Mobile Network is now supporting RTPI in the West Midlands

New technologies for operational control and customer service in passenger transport are opening up new management challenges and areas for specifying and sourcing cost-effective systems.

Real time passenger information provides a significant boost to the quality of the customer experience. But it also means defining and operating a robust data capture and information transfer regime.

Mobile telecommunications have been the key to unlocking this capability – and that world has its own set of protocols and performance standards to learn.

Accuracy is vital in real time systems, as wrong information quickly erodes user confidence. So is ensuring consistent performance – without blank screens or bland apology messages! And alongside these aspirations, the cost of phone connections is an area for careful control – as any mobile user will know.

Private Mobile Networks can provide an attractive answer to both the quality of service and cost challenges, having rapidly taken over from the original phone, ISDN, DSL and broadband fixed line cable systems for data transfer.

Centro, the West Midlands Integrated Transport Authority, has been a keen proponent of real time information as it promotes and develops public transport across the region.

Last year, Centro reviewed the data costs for all their Real Time Passenger Information (RTPI) on street displays, on-bus equipment and other hand held devices to see if cost reductions could be made from moving to a private network whilst maintaining the support from existing supplier Vodafone, which was regarded as very good.

Through its membership of the Real Time Information Group (RTIG) Centro can harness the benefit of national framework contracts secured by RTIG following open competition under European procurement rules. Pricing through these contracts can represent a significant saving over standard voice and business rates when applied to RTPI applications. For this switch, Vodafone worked with a partner for Machine to Machine applications, Mobius Networks, a specialist in both local government and RTPI systems, alongside its major credit card payment systems business.

By working together, Vodafone and Mobius proved able to transfer the West Midlands RTPI system to a team dedicated to local government and public transport with improved billing granularity, greater security, and better technical support.

It is the SIMs that are the core of the system and one of the biggest issues with a change in mobile service providers is the need to physically swap out the SIMs in the network. Changing these in a bus fleet poses a limited degree of difficulty. But street furniture- bus stops, information points, cameras and signs are generally remote, and the cost of visiting all of these sites outside of routine maintenance may more than negate any potential savings.

By giving Mobius unusual access to the Vodafone system, this change for Centro was completed without switching out SIMs on the hundreds of street displays around the West Midlands. The connections now run over a Private Mobile Network with no internet access, making each connection isolated and secure. In addition this will allow the introduction of fixed IP connections over mobile, supporting true bidirectional data flow from the centre to all of the remote signs and buses and back.

This will allow Centro to continue to improve its system whilst Mobius provides a fixed IP over mobile solution. As Centro move more of their data connections estate over, it is estimated that costs will be cut by around 30%.

By working in partnership, Vodafone and Mobius are actually able to transition the airtime systems using two private networks in tandem, switching between the two without interruption to service.

Whereas the standard mobile network model is to push the packet data on to the internet, assigning a random IP address for the session, Mobius and Vodafone use specific Access Point Names to channel the data through dedicated data pipes to Mobius-hosted servers. Each unit then handshakes with a unique username and password, is allocated a fixed IP address and then pushed through to the destination.

A Mobile Private Network keeps mobile devices off open internet access and mobile fixed IP supports true bi-directional data. This means that all of the mobile units then become part of a Wide Area Network (WAN) where data can flow securely and easily, potentially forming an integral part of a wider Urban Traffic Management System.

www.mobiusnetworks.co.uk