OneBusAway Multi-region makes is easy for new cities to make Android, iPhone, Windows Phone, and Windows 8 apps available in their region. This presentation discusses the background, goals, and outcome of the project.

1. OneBusAway Multi-region
Rapidly Expanding Mobile
Transit Apps to New Cities
Sean J. Barbeau, Ph.D.
Center for Urban Transportation Research | University of South Florida

2. Background
Tony Kurdzuk/The Star-Ledger
• Real-time transit information has many benefits
– Shorter perceived wait time [1]
– Shorter actual wait time [1]
– Lowers learning curve for new riders [2]
– Increased ridership (maybe?) [3]
– Increased feeling of safety (e.g., at night) [5][6]
• Riders prefer accessing real-time transit info via
mobile apps
[1]
[1] Kari Edison Watkins, Brian Ferris, Alan Borning, G. Scott Rutherford, and David Layton (2011), "Where Is My Bus? Impact of mobile real-time information on the perceived and actual wait time of transit riders," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Vol. 45 pp.
839-848.
[2] C. Cluett, S. Bregman, and J. Richman (2003). "Customer Preferences for Transit ATIS," Federal Transit Administration. Available at http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/jpodocs/repts_te/13935/13935.pdf#sthash.jwn5Oltr.dpuf
[3] Lei Tang and Piyushimita Thakuriah (2012), "Ridership effects of real-time bus information system: A case study in the City of Chicago," Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies, Vol. 22 pp. 146-161.
[4] Aaron Steinfeld and John Zimmerman, "Interviews with transit riders in San Francisco and Seattle," ed, 2010.
[5] Brian Ferris, Kari Watkins, and Alan Borning (2010), "OneBusAway: results from providing real-time arrival information for public transit," in Proceedings of the 28th International CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, pp. 1807-181
[6] A. Gooze, K. Watkins, and A. Borning (2013), "Benefits of Real-Time Information and the Impacts of Data Accuracy on the Rider Experience," in Transportation Research Board 92nd Annual Meeting, Washington, D.C., January 13, 2013.
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3. Challenge
• Custom mobile apps are expensive
– Some estimates > $150,000k for a single platform [7]
– Doesn’t include maintenance cost
• Implementing and maintaining custom apps on
all popular smartphone platforms is costprohibitive
• Open data is good, but doesn’t always result in
apps by 3rd party developers
[7] Larry Lauvray "iPad App Development Cost - A Breakdown." Propelics Blog, Vol. Accessed at: http://www.propelics.com/ipad-app-development-cost-a-breakdown/
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4. OneBusAway
• Open-source real-time
transit information system
• Created by University of
Washington
• Includes mobile apps:
–
–
–
–
iPhone
Android
Windows Phone
Windows 8
http://onebusaway.org
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5. OneBusAway – Mobile Apps
Android
iPhone
Support user location, route, stop contextual/personalized information
All OPEN-SOURCE!
Windows Phone &
Windows 8
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6. OneBusAway
• Open-source real-time
transit information system
• Created by University of
Washington
• Includes mobile apps:
–
–
–
–
iPhone
Android
Windows Phone
Windows 8
• 2012 – Mobile apps only
available in Puget Sound
• How do we expand them to
new cities?
http://onebusaway.org
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7. Innovation – OneBusAway Multi-region
• Created
centralized server
directory
• Modified apps to
find cities using
directory
• Add a new city by
adding a record in
the directory
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8. OneBusAway Server Directory
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9. OBA – Android app
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10. Results
• OneBusAway mobile apps deployed to new cities:
– Tampa (tampa.onebusaway.org)
– Atlanta (atlanta.onebusaway.org) (w/ Georgia Tech)
– More coming soon!
• Sustainable, scalable, low-cost, and lowmaintenance model for expanding real-time
transit apps to new cities
– New city supplies real-time info & OneBusAway
server, OneBusAway project provides the apps
• Controlled study in Tampa w/ Georgia Tech
– Still analyzing results
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11. New OneBusAway Region Checklist






Transit Data in GTFS format
AVL system that provides arrival estimates
Implement a GTFS-realtime (or SIRI) feed
Set up a OneBusAway Server
Do some quality-control testing
Launch OneBusAway apps in new city!
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12. Acknowledgements
• Full acknowledgements for OneBusAway
Multi-region Initiative are at:
– http://bit.ly/OBA_multiregion_blog
• Funding for USF’s work provided by the
National Center for Transit Research
• Thanks to Hillsborough Area Regional Transit’s
support for the OneBusAway Tampa public
deployment
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13. Thanks!
Sean J. Barbeau, Ph.D.
barbeau@cutr.usf.edu
813.974.7208
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