Managing vehicle operations efficiently and productively is a great challenge today in the fleet industry, especially in mobile environments such as public transportation services. Passenger transport companies face many challenges. For example, vehicle inspections, route management, regulatory requirements, maintenance, and safety with over 100 busses running more than 100 routes every day.
In this blog, we explore the challenges faced in daily operations, plus solutions that maximize bus efficiency and safety with fleet management and telematics Astreon offers.
A typical day for a transit operator
Let’s take a look at a day in the life of a transit operator.
Meet John, a driver at a local bus service company, who has worked for 5 years.
1. Clocking in
After arriving at work, John prepares for the day, grabs a cash box, heads to an operation counter, and his route for the day.
2. Inspection
John heads to an assigned bus and does a thorough pre trip inspection. He takes a couple of notes on paper checklist and makes sure the bus is safe to operate. It is mandatory to do a pre/post trip inspection such as the lights, tire pressure, doors, windshield wipers, fluid levels, brakes and etc.
Challenges
The company is using a paper-based inspection process, storing hard copies of all pre-and post-trip inspection forms in boxes. This process causes storage, data retention and data collection issues. The stored forms take up valuable space and are difficult to use for reporting and determining necessary maintenance and unplanned repairs. It’s easy for drivers to overlook some processes and they are not compelled to complete the inspection forms thoroughly. Overall, the paper-based inspection process is slowing down operations and creating a compliance exposure. This type of process also increases maintenance and repairs costs as small issues not properly dealt with can turn into expensive repairs down the line.
Solutions
A mobile and cloud-based fleet operation management solution
Using operation management Driveroo, which is a mobile and cloud-based fleet operation management solution, drivers have full access to visual inspection workflows from their mobile devices. Driveroo can turn any paper form into a fast, mistake-free automated process to boost operations and lower costs. A driver can streamline the inspection process using the app with a visual, asset-specific interface that incorporates required checklists and captures details, voice, image and video. All drivers need to do is just follow the easy visual guidance and tap to check items, flag issues and share inspection data with a team or a fleet manager in real-time.
3. Operate assigned routes
After finishing the pre-trip inspection, John heads out for the day. The shift card is made up of multiple runs at multiple different locations for the day.
Challenges
Keeping operations on time smoothly and safely is a primary task for transportation services. The manual process could cause a delay due to traffic, weather, maintenance issues, and unexpected accidents. Those events require support from the back office to get the bus operation back to normal and in a safe manner. In addition, it is crucial for a fleet manager to monitor driver behaviour to prevent unnecessary accidents, violations and unprofessional driving behaviour, such as speeding, unnecessary acceleration, heavy braking, and acceleration while cornering. These actions often increase maintenance costs and contribute to an unsafe environment.
Solutions
Public Transportation Management
Using a Transit Management solution enables bus service companies and drivers to digitize all processes, reduce human error, reduce costs, and improve safety.
Nimbus is a public transport management system that combines location-based services with route and schedule management. It has specialized tools designed for route management and can create stops, optimize routes, distribute vehicles across routes, manage schedules, and track route performance in real-time.
A fleet manager can create routes, add schedules, and track vehicle movement in real-time. It also sends notifications to control late/early arrivals, deviations from the route and other conditions demanding immediate intevention such as an emergency.
With Nimbus reports, a fleet manager has access to Ride History and performance quality assessment in terms of routes and vehicles. Analytics allow companies to further optimize the operations of passenger transportation services.
Dash camera
Transit operators are responsible for ensuring smooth operations of a transportation service. Connected Dash Cameras capture critical driving incidents, such as lane departure, forward collision, and improper driver behaviour, and can alert users in real-time.
Dash Cameras can also be leveraged for the evaluation of drivers’ professionalism and rewards for drivers. Cloud-based dash cameras upload events to the monitoring platform to be reviewed by managers or safety and compliance to identify areas to improve and reward positive behaviour.
Astreon’s A.I. Dashcam is an all-in-one recorder designed to increase safe driving. It has all the features of a regular dash camera, and also supports intelligent driving assistance. It also has the advantages of a powerful telematics tracker, competitive price, and is an enterprise grade device.
Astreon’s’s built-in A.I. cameras help avoid unnecessary accidents, providing advanced active collision warning by intelligently identifying vehicles, lanes, and traffic ahead. Effectively predicting driving hazards such as tailgating, front & pedestrian collision, and lane departure.
- Front Collision Warning
- Lane Departure Warning
- Headway Monitoring and Warning
- Pedestrian Collision Warning
- Front Departure Warning
- Blind Spot Detection
- Stop Sign
- Speed Limit Detection
Intelligently identifying the driver’s behaviours such as using mobile phones while driving, being drowsy, distracted, and not wearing a seatbelt via the cabin camera. It also includes alerts that reduce traffic accidents caused by driver behaviours.
- Phone Usage & Texting
- Seat Belt
- Face Recognition
- Distraction
- Fatigue
Driver Safety
Professional and careful driving contributes to reducing fuel costs, extends vehicle service life, and improves fleet safety for passengers and drivers.
To improve drivers’ professionalism and performance, driving behaviour monitoring is a key service.
Eco Driving (Safety+) Astreon is an app that helps assess a driver’s performance. The solution evaluates driving skills based on penalty points for violations such as speeding, unnecessary acceleration, heavy braking, acceleration while cornering, etc.
Driving behaviour analysis helps operators or fleet owners discipline and educate drivers.
Eco Driving also has the following features;
- Trip analysis
- A detailed report on trips with a map and a violations table
- The driver’s rating displayed regarding the trip duration in the form of a column.
- Reports
- Several types of reports for a comprehensive driving behaviour analysis: by a driver, group of drivers or units for any period
- Export to PDF and XLSX files.
- Driver Score
- Eco Driving (Safety+) enables you to establish a baseline score across all drivers in your fleet based on their driving habits. It is an easy and intuitive way to provide coaching to your drivers by analyzing and highlighting top critical events that contributed to their scores.
4. Final Trip and clock-out
John finished his final trip and makes his way back to the depot. He starts a post-trip check and reports it to a manager if there is any vehicle faults or damages. He returns his cash box and prepares to clock out.
Benefits of Using Bus & Transport Fleet Management
Using and combining powerful apps, software and telematics enable managers to quickly detect and educate ineffective drivers. Bus & Transport Fleet Management also helps companies reduce maintenance costs, improves safety and service quality. For drivers, Bus & Transport Fleet Management helps improve their driving skills, increases safety and morale.
Astreon – A leader in connected transportation solutions
Astreon is a Mobile Workforce management expert in custom software development and application development for Canadian Fortune 500 Companies. Our platform connects to over 3.4 million vehicles and our open platform offers options for over 20 business-specific companion application solutions. Our customers rely on our services daily as business process management tools and benefit from multiple add-on tools and applications such as Compliant ELD, Maintenance Management, Driver Coaching, Video Management Dashboard, KPI Measurement Dashboards, Logistics & Dispatch tools, plus many more.
Connect with us today to find out more about how Astreon can benefit your business.
