Big data is mass transit’s next stop

Transportation systems across the globe serve massive swaths of the population, fulfilling their primary transit needs. Smartphones are becoming one of passengers’ favorite traveling companions, as users turn to schedules, maps, fare finders, and even mobile passes to make travel less stressful and more informed. As smartphones continue to gain new senses—to understand where users are, what they are doing, and when they are using their devices—transit providers have an opportunity to understand passengers’ travel habits and deliver new types of experiences.

Smartphone users are growing accustomed to location playing a role in mobile experiences, and transportation companies can leverage information from users’ GPS locations to understand user behaviors. Whether logging into Google Maps or tapping into a specific city’s transit tracker, users expect results to be catered to their exact location the moment they need to get from A to B. Transportation companies can use contextual data from smartphone statistics that outline where and when users need their smartphone during travel, informing commute habits and enabling companies to better serve information relevant to a user’s specific routine. Companies can deliver notifications related to traffic conditions, track closures, and delays in user-specific and unobtrusive ways.

While individuals’ location information provides detailed data, perfect for insight into user experience, the massive amounts of location data collected on a macro scale can be used at a high level to analyze a city’s population movement and large-scale trends. As cities grow and pockets of people move from popular neighborhoods and areas, public transit need to evolve alongside them, building new stations or altering mass transportation routes to accommodate new riders. Companies looking to deliver to mobile users in the public transportation space need to consider both the individual user and the commuter population as a whole. Punchkick strategist Connor Mason explains how understanding riders from a macroscopic level will help transportation companies better understand larger trends and react to the behaviors of populations.

“But understanding the individual’s habits, and designing products that improve actual riders’ daily routines, will encourage loyalty and inspire delight,” says Mason.

Building on this macroscopic understanding can allow transportation companies to provide new insights to individuals on the microscopic level. Understanding traffic patterns and large-scale historical behaviors can help connected apps and services guide users along their commutes.

The future of public transportation is in the hands of its passengers. Smartphone users provide invaluable information about the developing wants and needs of people in motion—it’s up to transit companies to deliver an experience that meets the demand. In a world where driverless cars are no longer limited to our imaginations, anything could be possible for what a city’s transit will be next. In the wise words of Dr. Emmett Brown from Back to the Future:

Where we are going, we don’t need roads.