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Title:

Stretching Transportation Anatomy: FlexBus Services in Central Florida

Accession Number:

01556541

Record Type:

Component

Availability:

Transportation Research Board Business Office

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Abstract:

In this paper, the authors discuss the need for, the challenges, and the opportunities of providing efficient transit in suburban areas. A review of the development of ‘flexible’ transit services is presented. Recent developments with the application of new, user-based and ubiquitous technology, such as smartphones and tablets, is discussed. This paper describes how recent developments in the application of new technology holds promise for viable and efficient means to serve suburban mobility. The discussion is based on the example of FlexBus, a public transit concept recently approved and funded by the Federal Transit Administration for a 12-month live revenue service demonstration in Central Florida. Similar to Uber and Lyft, FlexBus will provide real-time, dynamic mobility in response to user requests. Unlike these private ventures, FlexBus is designed as an affordable shared-ride public transit service. FlexBus uses the technology in tablets plus advanced routing, vehicle assignment, and predictive vehicle location algorithms to provide an app-based point-to-point service with a response time to user requests of 15 minutes or less. Development of the FlexBus operating concept is completed, a two-month field operational test of the technology is completed, the technology vendor is secured, and a solicitation for the operating contractor is ready to be released. This paper describes the operational model and operating requirements for the demonstration.

Supplemental Notes:

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AP020 Emerging and Innovative Public Transport and Technologies.

Monograph Accession #:

01550057

Report/Paper Numbers:

15-5570

Language:

English

Corporate Authors:

Transportation Research Board

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Authors:

Campbell, Morgan
Farwell, Randall
Weinberger, Rachel

Pagination:

16p

Publication Date:

2015

Conference:

Transportation Research Board 94th Annual Meeting

Location: Washington DC, United States
Date: 2015-1-11 to 2015-1-15
Sponsors: Transportation Research Board

Media Type:

Digital/other

Features:

Figures; Maps; References; Tables

Identifier Terms:

FlexBus

Geographic Terms:

Florida

Subject Areas:

Planning and Forecasting; Public Transportation; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning

Source Data:

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2015 Paper #15-5570

Files:

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Created Date:

Dec 30 2014 1:52PM