b'THE ITSPresidentJohnF.Kennedyoncesaid,engineersbackin1996.Itisthissame Leadership and learning are indispensablecultureofinnovationanddevotiontoINTELLIGENT TRANSPORT SYSTEMS to each other. As the pace of technologyflawless execution that led to the creation CUSTOMERinnovationincreasesintheIntelligentof the Customer Experience Lab. NASA Transportationspace,chancesareyouhasareputationforrelentlesstestingAND PUBLIC TRANSPORT IN THE UKmaybefindingitharderandhardertobefore going live with a project. With the EXPERIENCEkeep up. As a leader in your organization,increasingstakesintheITSworld,thisBy Jennie Martin youre expected to keep up with the latestmindset can help catch potential problems innovationsanddeterminehowthesebefore its too late. LAB innovations can impact your organization,ThegoaloftheEtherWANCustomer all while ensuring that your current systemsExperience Lab is to help you answer theBackaroundtheyear2000,theUKEvolutionhasgatheredpacesincethen.public transport so simple and accessible YOUR STRATEGIC WEAPON work smoothly and consistently. Its a tallquestions:WhatifmyITSorganizationDepartment for Transport (DfT) decided toSmartphones,theappsthatcomewiththatthemainfactorinpeoplenottrying orderthatcanputalotofpressureondecides to implement (x)? What will thebump start the provision of real-time busthem,principlesofopentransportdatait,theembarrassmentfactor,disappears.you and your team. Its with this mindset By Derek Johnson thatEtherWANcreatedtheCustomerimpact be? How will it work in our existinginformationwithagenerous20million+and the desire to do useful things with it, Experience Lab. system? How will it improve our existingfund.Thetechnologywasfairlywelland the general population embracing thePlanningjourneysisanotherimportant system? Do we have the right people inestablished and was in use in a small numberstatus of always-connected, have enabledITS application in public transport. This is TohelpITSorganizationssuccessfullyplace with the right technology experienceof U.K. locations and elsewhere in Europe,a true step of change for public transportanother area where historically, the need to navigatethesechanges,EtherWANweneedtomakethiswork?Bybeingbut neither local transport authorities norITS. Contactless payments, where a cardknow about routes and stops has worked establishedtheEtherWANCustomerabletoanswerthesequestionsonthebusoperatorsinEnglandwereshowingoradevicelinkedtoyourbankaccountto create a public transport club opaque Experience Lab to help ITS teams receivefrontend,youandyourteamwillhavemuch enthusiasm for spending their ownenables the payment, has made paying forand unwelcoming to car users. With the firsthandexperienceacrossthemanytheconfidencetomoveforward.Peacemoney on it. public transport as easy as it can be beforecreation of detailed and accurate data for types of linked technologies. Located atof mind is one of those things that cantwe move on to biometric payment wheretime table and stop information and the the EtherWAN headquarters in Anaheim,be put into a budget, and as the sayingThis was the first major Intelligent Transportwe, ourselves, are the device. Buying theaddition of real-time journey data, it has California,theEtherWANCustomergoes, Not everything that counts can beSystem(ITS)implementationforpublicright ticket for your journey is a huge barrierbecome possible to create detailed and Experience Lab is a partnership with ITScounted, and not everything that can betransport in the U.K. that I am aware of; itto public transport use. You have secondstrustworthy journey planners. Seeing the innovatorsacrosstheITStechnologycounted counts. was followed a few years later by a majorto grasp a structure of zones, days of thestop on a map removes the anxiety over spectrum. The goal is for you and yourpush on smartcard ticketing, again led byweek, times of days, ages of passengers,which side of the road is the right one for ITSteamtolearnaboutthelatestITSThe EtherWAN Customer Experience LabtheDfTwiththeirIntegratedTransportand so on, which has taken a city a hundredthe direction you want to travel, and some technologies in a product agnostic placewill help you and your organization to: SmartcardOrganisation(ITSO)standard.years or more to construct. Failure to do soapps even show you the bus approaching so you can experience firsthand how the1.Connect a potential project to ROI We didnt go from everything on paper tofast enough makes you the most unpopularwhichgives100percentconfidence, myriadoftechnologiesworktogether,2.Unite your team in focus,everythingIT-basedovernight,butthoseperson in the ticket hall or on the bus. Someeven if you have a while to wait. These along with the pros and cons of each forprioritization, and commitments twodevelopmentssetanexpectationso-called smart ticketing systems are notapplicationsofreal-timedataarealso your organization. GRIDSMART was one3.Expose any organizational silos thatthatITScouldandshoulddeliverbettermuch better: I have experienced boardingimmenselysupportiveduringtimesof of the first companies to step up to thejourneys for bus passengers, all too oftena tram in Gothenburg and being stumpedservicedisruption,anotherexampleof plate and send their solution for use in thecould derail a project atthebottomofthetransportsystemsby the smart card reader requiring me toasituationwherehistoricallyyoueither lab.4.Help future proof your organization userhierarchy.Althoughitisstartlingtospecify the number of zones and people.knew the local public transport network remember that back in those days, in manyButcontactlessremoveseverytraceofas well as the operator did, or you were in Technology represented in the CustomerBenjaminFranklinfamouslysaid,Anlocations,cyclistsweregivenevenlessfriction except the need to have a bank cardserious trouble.ExperienceLabincludesmocktrafficinvestmentinknowledgepaysthebestspendingandservicesprioritythanbuswith you. And if you have left your wallet at intersectionswithcontrollers,stoplights,interest.WeatEtherWANSystems,users. How times do change. home, your day is already ruinedyou wontTheseimportantdevelopmentsare sensors,andsurveillance.TheseGRIDSMART,andourotherCustomerbe blaming public transport for your misery. underpinned by a sector-wide commitment intersections,amongothertechnology,ExperienceLabpartnerscouldntagreePrinciples of real-time information and smartto the principles of open data. Everybody areconnectedtoa4-screenCentralmore. ticketing did not just apply to bus services.Noteverybodyhasabankaccountininvolved needs to accept that sharing data MonitoringSystem(CMS)controllingallTrains,coaches,andthevariousformssomecitiesintheU.K.,30percentofis not commercial suicide. It grows a market functionalityandshowcasingsoftwareEtherWANholdseventsatthelabof light rail we have in the U.K., from thebus users are unbankedand they mustfor everybody to profit from. In the U.K., we from partners. throughout the year that are open to all ITSworlds first underground rail in London tonot be left without access to good valueare close to achieving this, thanks to strong organizations. We invite you to call us atthe much newer tram network in Edinburgh,publictransporttickets.Butcontactlessgovernment support and many of the major EtherWANwasfoundedbyNASA(714) 779-3800 to learn more. n all gradually adopted some measure of ITS.is still a major step in the quest to makecommercial actors taking a strategic long-The fact that outside London these servicesterm view. nare almost all run by commercial companies Derek Johnson is an Ethernet networking and fiber optic technologycould slow down investment in technology,Jennie Martin joined ITS United Kingdom, the Intelligent Transport expert and trusted advisor to key decision makers. He was an originalseenasprovidingdoubtfulreturns.ButSociety for the UK, in 1998. Prior to that, she worked in the City member on the board of directors on the Fiber Broadband Association,good efforts and investment by transportEngineersDepartmentattheCorporationofLondon,thelocal a consortium of companies dedicated to bringing Broadband Internetauthorities and raised public expectationsauthority for the Square Mile financial district of London. Jennie to Americans everywhere. He currently leads partnerships and businessbegan her working life with the then British Rail in 1986.development at EtherWAN Systems. also carried weight.11 12'