Luas-style priority for Dublin Bus

Dublin Bus is to get priority at traffic lights, similar to that provided for Luas, under a new programme to help its buses meet timetables.

As part of an estimated €15 million contract due to be signed, up-to-the minute passenger information will be provided at major bus stops. The system, which uses GPS, will tell passengers when the next bus is due.

The plan aims to overhaul how the fleet operates and to counter one of the biggest problems facing the company: increasing delays due to congestion and the resulting disruption to timetables for customers.

According to Dublin Bus, within two years its busiest bus stops will have screens showing exactly when the next bus on each route is due, based on a GPS system which will be installed in the entire fleet.

This information will also be made available to passengers online or on their phone. Updated information is provided by a computer system which will recalculate the position of the bus every 30 seconds using GPS.

This data is then compared with its scheduled location before an updated arrival time is sent to display units at bus stops along the route.

Donal Keating, operations support manager with Dublin Bus, said a preferred bidder for the contract has been identified from three shortlisted companies following a tender process. The Dublin Bus board is due to consider this recommendation before the end of the year.

"It became obvious that with the city slowing down due to congestion, this information was going to become more important and we were starting to lag behind what Irish Rail and Luas were doing," Mr Keating said.

Dublin Bus also expects the system to help its fleet counter delays caused by congestion.

"The system won't try to rig the lights for individual buses. But on major bus corridors it might hold the lights green for longer to keep the buses moving," Mr Keating said.

"However, the system will be flexible enough so that at certain times where there is only a bus on approach, a small transmitter will send a signal to the traffic lights and they will stay or come back to green," he said.

The new Dublin Bus technology is also going to be linked to the traffic management system (SCATS) used by Dublin City council.

"Dublin City council's system will know where our buses are at all times and this will allow us to respond to delays or log jams," Mr Keating said.

One requirement of the project is that the design will allow it to be easily extended to an outside, private operator.

"If another operator equips their fleet with transponders, they too can join the system. And it is being designed so that it would be possible for the Dublin Transport Authority to take over the real-time passenger element and perhaps link it with other public transport passenger information," Mr Keating said.

Dublin Bus expects that more than 1,000 of its busiest 5,000 bus stops will be fitted with the display screens. The contract is due to be signed in the coming weeks, with work on the project starting early next year.

"Hopefully by 2009 you will start to see this on the streets and it will be complete by 2010," Mr Keating said.

The company hopes that the new system will remove the uncertainty over when the next bus is due.

Many European cities now have similar systems for their bus fleets. Dublin Bus project officials visited Edinburgh, Munich and Brighton to examine passenger information systems in operation.

These cities each have a similar system operated by one of the short-listed bidders for the Dublin Bus contract. Dublin Bus has conducted trials of similar systems in recent years and does not expect any resistence from staff to the new technology.