Cluj-Napoca opens public transport data with a real-time bus tracking

The move is part of the local digitalization strategy, offering an open data platform to be used by anyone who has an idea of how to make public transport better

Last week, authorities in Romania’s Cluj-Napoca announced a new digital add-on for citizens travelling with public transport. The city signed a deal with the company tranzy.ai to provide an open data platform for travel information, including routes, stations, planning, drivers and timetables.

Additionally, according to an official statement, the platform will provide real-time locations for all buses, which updates every 20 seconds. This will provide passengers with very accurate information on their incoming buses and connections.

Boosting quality of life indicators

The move is part of Cluj-Napoca’s digitalisation strategy which is centred on two concepts – offering open data sets to the public and any other private interested parties and building upon the city’s development strategy on dealing with the brain drain.

In particular, the measure aims at boosting quality-of-life indicators – a central point of the city’s long-term strategy. One of the contributors is public transport, while another point is a collaborative approach between city authorities and community groups and companies.

This prompted Mayor Emil Boc to call on citizens to use the Open Data for public transport and innovate. He was quoted in a press statement, explaining:

I encourage the community, individuals and companies interested in improving the quality of life in the city where they live to access the Open Data portal made available through the partnership with tranzy.ai and to collaborate to identify the needs of  citizens  and to develop new services and products for accessibility, mobility, air quality, reducing time spent in traffic or generating new jobs.

The Open Data portal for public transport

The Cluj-Napoca Public Transport Company and local authorities launched a partnership programme with tranzi.ai that should help with managing the fleet of over 400 vehicles. The partnership would help transport authorities automate daily operations.

Additionally, it would include the creation of an open data platform, open to citizens, public and private actors. Tranzy.ai will have free access to many basic and fundamental functions of public transport, including vehicles, locations, drivers, stations and depots. In turn, this would help public authorities digitalise the whole system using their tools.

This includes fleet management solution/AVL software, mobile application for dispatchers and route alerts associated with routes. Through this, tranzi.ai will be able to create a real-time map showing the position of vehicles, updated every 20 seconds.

The map is available both as a desktop version and an application on Android and i/OS, through the tranzy.app.