Bus Franchising Data Project: Important Lessons Learned
Bus Franchising Data Project: Important Lessons Learned
By Tony Melvin, Principal Consultant
Local authorities across the UK are taking back control of their public transport systems, with success hinging on, amongst other things, a solid data strategy. From managing contracts and integrating data sources, to ensuring seamless reporting, navigating these complexities can be a challenge.
synvert TCM has been at the forefront of this movement, powering Greater Manchester’s Bee Network with a robust, scalable Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW). Through this journey, we’ve uncovered valuable lessons that can help other regions implement bus franchising effectively while staying on time and budget.
In this article, you can find out the critical lessons we learned to successfully deliver your transport projects, mitigate risks, and future-proof your systems.
Six Absolute Must Do's
Six Absolute Must Do's
1. Know Your Stakeholders and Decision Makers
The key decision-makers set the deadlines, and while data is super important, it’s usually not the thing driving those timelines. When data readiness and deadlines don’t quite line up, it’s crucial to get on the same page early about which use cases really matter. Take TfGM as an example, in Phase 1, they decided to prioritise revenue reporting over real-time tracking.
2. Don't Delay, Time is of the Essence
When it comes to building your data infrastructure and planning the use case led delivery roadmap, there’s no such thing as starting too early. The sooner you lay the foundation, the smoother things will go down the road!
3. Define Data Contracts Upfront - Good Data Quality Is Vital
Data contracts are an essential part of delivering a reliable data solution to power your transport decision making, here are a few key factors to consider:
Define data contracts upfront
Decide how often APIs need to refresh
Find out if providers can push data automatically
Document these rules early to prevent pipeline pile-ups down the line
4. Be Realistic About Your Delivery Roadmap
Your roadmap might look perfect until your data provider pushes delivery back by six months. Make sure to always reassess timelines regularly, and if possible build in contingency, as third-party capabilities often fall short of expectations. Make sure you know where your key dependencies are, and the impact of missing these or other pre-requisites.
5. Design For The Future, As Well As The Present
Keep flexibility at the forefront when designing. Build your data models to handle all kinds of transport systems; buses, trams, trains, bike rentals, pedestrian data, and whatever else might come down the line. And don’t assume the scope will stay the same—it rarely does! One of the biggest wins from our TfGM project was being able to support multi-model transport through one technical data solution.
6. Automate Monitoring And Alerting From The Start
Understanding the nuts and bolts of data pipelines will allow for appropriate monitoring and alerting, which is key to keeping systems running smoothly. You can stay on top of it by:
- Auto-alerting stakeholders when something’s off.
- Generate support tickets to tackle issues quickly.
- Validating data files early to catch problems before they snowball.
Important Ways of Working
Important Ways of Working
- Close collaboration across the delivery team - Daily meetings keep everything running smoothly, and help catch problems early, so you're not blindsided by surprises later.
- Clarity and consistency in definition of terms - Ensure everyone speaks the same language i.e. “service disruption” can mean different things to planners, engineers, and CFOs.
- Establish the importance of setting data priorities early - Data often gets pushed aside for other priorities like acquiring vehicles etc, but this just causes downstream problems.
- Define reporting requirements to avoid wasted effort - Challenge the all-too-common request “we need everything in the pipeline for reporting” as this will waste time and money.
Provider Paralysis - The More You Have The More Complex It Gets
Provider Paralysis - The More You Have The More Complex It Gets
- Data provider maturity may not be where you want it to be: Technology providers for modern transport systems aren’t always chosen based on their data-sharing capabilities. Sometimes, you’ll be stuck with old-school flat files, so prepare by building flat-file and Excel parsers in advance.
- Numerous data providers means more data mapping requirements: If you don’t stay on top of those mapping files, you’ll quickly find yourself buried in endless requests, leaving little room for innovation. Staying ahead of it keeps things moving smoothly!
- Data providers often define data in their own way: One might call an apple a fruit, another a vegetable, and a third might use the “apple” column to store a bus registration number. It can get messy fast! Having clear data dictionaries and some solid experience helps keep this chaos in check.
Key Takeaways
Key Takeaways
- Prioritise data upfront and align stakeholders to its importance.
- Plan meticulously but expect the unexpected, build in contingency.
- Make sure everyone is talking the same language.
- Build for now, and the future - you want a solution that is flexible and adaptable.
- Collaborate closely as a team to facilitate quick responses to challenges.
- Prioritise, prioritise and prioritise - focus on the value adding activities.
Want To Learn More?
Want To Learn More?
Join our upcoming webinar and hear from TfGM and Nottingham City Council and learn how data and AI can optimise transport networks, enhance efficiency, and shape the future of mobility.
