Global Positioning Systems (GPS)
Indra's Intelligent Technology Will Improve Public Transportation Management in the Polish City of Wroclaw
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o The city's Municipal Transportation Company has awarded Indra a Euros1.7 million contract to install an Operations Assistance System (OAS) that includes information for passengers, fleet management and video surveillance.
o The OAS will provide greater efficiency in managing Wroclaw's buses and trams as well as improve the quality of the services offered to residents, safety and vandalism control.
o This Polish project reinforces Indra as a leader of public passenger transportation operations assistance systems, with nearly 10,000 vehicles managed using its technology throughout the world.
Indra, the top IT multinational in Spain and one of the leaders in Europe, has been awarded a contract with the Public Transportation Municipal Company in Wroclaw, which is the fourth largest city in Poland, to install its intelligent public transportation management technology for Euros1.7 million and a one year execution period.
Indra will install an Operations Assistance System (OAS) that includes passenger information subsystems, fleet management and video surveillance for 251 vehicles, 136 buses and 115 trams in the city. The OAS will provide greater management efficiency and improve the quality of the services offered to residents, information about demand, employee and user safety, vandalism control and accident audits.
The OAS, the "brains" behind passenger transport, will consist of three basic pillars: on-board GPS-based management, control and location equipment; a mobile communications infrastructure based on GPRS and 3G technology; and the control centre, which monitors and controls the service and is based on geographic information systems (GIS) that make it possible to know the location of any fleet vehicle at any moment and to make decisions in real time in the event of incidents, reinforcement needs, etc. The solution will also include tools for generating reports and graphs, which facilitate supervising the service and measuring its quality parameters so it may be better adjusted to actual citizen demands.
This technology makes it possible to manage the on-board public information system from the control centre. The system provides information to passengers such as the next stop, possible incidents, estimated arrival times, etc., and also allows to manage the broadcast of advertising, news or entertainment content, among others.
Video surveillance system for increased safety
The on-board video surveillance system will also be fully integrated with the OAS and it will allow to record, transmit and view images in real time. Each vehicle will be equipped with several cameras (in some cases up to ten) with the aim of offering increased safety to employees and users, while dissuading and helping prevent possible aggressions or vandalism to windows and seats, which is a practice that results in significant maintenance costs for public passenger transportation companies. One of the cameras--the "driver's eye"--will focus on the road ahead to view exactly what the driver sees, which will be a great assistance for audits that are performed in the event of an accident as well as for the control centre to know the status of traffic or possible incidents in real time.
In addition, 18 vehicles will be equipped with a passenger counter system that will record the number of passengers who board and exit, making it possible to know the current occupancy so as to avoid surpassing the maximum capacity, request reinforcement vehicles for demand peaks, perform mobility studies, etc. The project also includes a navigation support system for drivers that provides voice orders from the control centre for regulating the service.
All the technology installed by Indra is especially designed to support extreme temperature conditions since Wroclaw can drop below -15ºC in the winter.
Nearly 10,000 vehicles managed throughout the world
This Polish project reinforces Indra as one of the leading companies for public transportation operations assistance systems, with nearly 10,000 vehicles managed using its technology throughout the world and references in countries that include Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Argentina, Morocco, Portugal and Spain. Indra's solution has also proven its versatility by allowing to manage railway lines, trams and buses for short, medium or long distance routes.
The application of public transportation management technology makes it possible to improve the service and promote its use by residents, which is a fundamental aspect at a time when one of the main challenges for the future, especially in urban settings, is to address the need for more efficient, ecological and sustainable transportation and mobility.
Indra is the number one IT multinational in Spain, and one of the leaders in Europe and Latin America. It is the second European company in its sector in terms of R&D, with more than Euros500 million invested in the last three years. Its 2011 revenues were Euros2.688 billion, and its international activities already represent 50%. The company employs more than 36,000 professionals and has clients in 118 countries.
