helping people out of their cars . . .and onto public transport

by providing reliable

information on how to bridge

“those final few miles” from

public transport node to

final destination

the challenge . . .

• born out of practical experience

• to help car drivers switch to public transport

• so a passenger can pre-book a cab to meet him or her at/near the public transport node

• combining train, metro, bus, ferry and air with taxi legs to create complete journeys

• to help non-drivers and reluctant drivers

• especially disabled passengers

existing cab information . . . • several sources of free taxi & private hire

information are available to the public

• not mapped to travel interchanges

• with no attempt at differentiation (except for operators with paid-for entries)

• unvalidated, so includes unlicensed firms

• so generally unreliable, unhelpful and even unsafe

the traintaxi solution . . .

• our database covers all train, tram, metro, underground, bus and coach stations in Britain

• identifies those interchanges with taxi ranks

• lists up to four local taxi or private hire operators serving almost every interchange

• identifies “on same route” alternatives for the remaining isolated / phantom interchanges

• practical, available, relevant

expression• need for simplicity and consistency

• maximum of four entries per interchange or stop

• “go to” references as hyperlinks

• aliases, alternative names, previous names

• limited by the medium

• importance of help / user assistance

which operators are listed?

• those that skilled compilers consider most suitable for serving each interchange

• no payments accepted from operators, or business relationships of any kind with them

• so total impartiality

• two objective criteria for listing

• five subjective criteria for listing

objective criteria for listing • licensing status checked*

with all District, Unitary and Metropolitan Councils

• business telephone listing checkedwith rural exceptions - all documented

* initially only taxis were listed for London stations until minicabs become fully regulated in 2008

however, total objectivity would be very expensive unless the highly fragmented taxi and private hire industry introduced an effective QA scheme - which seems unlikely

subjective criteria for listing

• communities served by each interchange/stop

• presence at / distance from interchange/stop

• type of operator: taxi and/or private hire

• size, standing & range of vehicles available

• feedback from passengers and operators

original printed Traintaxi Guide

• launched in 2000 by DETR minister Keith Hill

• not only comprehensive listings

• but advice for passengers

• well received by both passengers and press

• never intended to be a best-seller

• quickly out-of-date

electronic versions . . .

• available on licence

• for supplying traintaxi information to the public

• mapped precisely to PTI providers’ systems

• updates fortnightly or monthly

• on www.traintaxi.co.uk since 2001

typical licensees . . .

• National Rail and Network Rail information for passengers

• Transport Direct to help create end-to-end journeys

• RailPlanner information for corporate users

• mobile app developers for travellers on the move

typical end users . . .

• business travellers premium on flexibility, speed, door-to-door

• leisure travellers price important; typically cab only if no bus

• disabled travellers but few wheelchair users; often hidden disabilities

• non-drivers or reluctant drivers especially to unknown places & overseas visitors

Q3 - what kind of rail journeys do you make?

Q9 - do you drive and have regular access to a car?

Q10 - will the easy availability of traintaxi information encourage

you to make more journeys by train rather than by car?

Q11 - overall, what is your opinion about the

traintaxi concept?

typical end user comments . . .

“This site is a great idea.”

“Good concept. Overall, I find it surprisingly comprehensive.”

“Please continue to provide this support.”

“Your service is very worthwhile and extremely welcome.”

“An excellent idea and a very useful site - keep up the good work!

“This is fantastic - thank you.”

“Hey, this actually WORKS!”

“Thank you for putting Traintaxi on the web.”

typical disabled user comments “Congratulations on providing a valuable service - the Traintaxi idea is an excellent one, providing vital information which is otherwise difficult to obtain. A significant step in making public transport easier to use for the disabled.”

“An excellent idea - so useful! As a disabled user, I used to have no end of problems obtaining phone numbers for taxis.”

typical business user comment

“Just to say I find your service extremely useful. I am a management consultant and generally work at my clients’ premises which can be anywhere in the UK. I always go by train if possible as I dislike driving and find the timing unreliable when jams occur; also I can use the time on the train to work, eat or relax. Your service fills the final step which always used to be a concern - whether there would be a taxi available or not to get me to my meeting on time - especially at the smaller stations or at unusual times of day.”

Transport Direct / Traveline• rail stations & rail-bus destinations (2,677)

• airports, airfields, airstrips (84)

• ferry ports and landings (449)

• metro destinations (1,253)

• NCSD coach stations and stops (852)

• plus child destinations (2,722)

• but what about bus stops . . . ?

of little help to the traveller

mapping to bus stops . . . • about 395,000 bus stops (about 331,000 live)

• 43,199 “Localities”, of which 26,265 have any bus stops

• ***G******** “StopAreaCodes”, which we use as parents where useful

• 9100 and Locality codes also used as parents

• we’ve leveraged our existing data to map to about 80,000 bus stops & bays

for named interchanges

for named coach stops

for bus stops in localities other than at interchanges or named coach stops

progress on bus stops . . .

• mapping to all remaining bays/ stances in all NCSD coach and bus stations (complete)

• mapping to all bays/ stances in all other known coach and bus stations (complete)

• mapping to all bus stops in small Localities that have NCSD services (complete)

• mapping to all bus stops at rail, ferry, metro & air interchanges (almost complete)

remaining tasks . . .

1 completing the leveraging of existing data

2 mapping to small Localities with cab firms

3 for small Localities without cab firms, using our custom algorithms for identifying nearest en route places with cab firms

4 mapping to urban Localities

will be completed by 31 December 2011

pointing to just the nearest realistic Localities with cab firms

pointing to a mixture of: (1) nearest realistic interchanges with taxi ranks or cab offices; and (2) nearest realistic Localities with local cab firms

• practical

• available

• compiled

• validated

• maintained

• integrative

• traintaxi data mapped to bus stops available on free licence to Traveline until 1 March 2013

• traintaxi limitedPO Box 366PETERBOROUGHPE2 6QH

• tel 01733 237037

• fax 01733 239933

• info@traintaxi.co.uk

• www.traintaxi.co.uk