Sunday, March 2, 2008

Send an SMS and track the Bus

Not bad at all, I didnt expect that communists in the east would allow such things. But kolkata has implemented this system and is helping commuter's keep track of their public transport system.

WBSTC officials said the system would benefit passengers and operators alike. "Passengers can even find out exactly how far away a bus is. This will help them time their departure from home. They won’t have to wait under the sun. As for operators, they would know how many passengers are taking a bus on a particular route during the day. This would tell us which are the busiest routes and help us cut down on unnecessary expenditure," an official said.

BSNL has helped get this system up and running. No idea how they have implemented it. One way could be embed a GSM module and use GPS to update the data ...say every 2 min or 5 min.
I dont see any need for such sophisticated service and no idea how it could be a revenue generator for BSNL if its not charging the SMS as premium one. The easier method could be, as the bus stops at particular stops, the driver or conductor could send in an SMS to the central unit where the data would be stored. So anyone sending an SMS to the central server could know the position of the time along with the last updated status. That way it could be like 50 paise per SMS and 20 such stops in a trip would mean just 10 bucks...rather than putting a GPS, then using a GSM module and constantly updating values.

The easiest way would be to put RFID tag in the bus and the receiver in the bus stops connected to telephone line. As the RFID receivers are placed on top of telephone poles, the theft of these devices to an extent could be avoided. As the bus pulls over, the reader scans the RFID tag and updates the servers. But the best way would be to put such a system in some local shops and help update the position values pertaining to each bus.

No comments: