Last week saw the 6th annual Train Communications Systems conference held in London, where train operating companies (TOCs), integrators and vendors gathered to discuss the latest developments in wireless communications on passenger rail. Organized by rail consultants BWCS , the event has quickly become an important one, high profile enough to attract participants from all over the world, including Amtrak and San Francisco’s Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Authority (CCJPA). The venue was the stunning $1.3 billion redevelopment of St. Pancras Station in North London, a Victorian Gothic masterpiece resplendent in brick, steel and glass, and surely one of the world’s most impressive rail terminals.

Passenger Wi-Fi drove the two-day agenda; with an estimated 34 major TOCs around the world planning on-train Wi-Fi. Wireless Internet access drives ticket sales and keeps passengers happy, according to Ross Parsons of BWCS, while a modal shift to trains of between 2% and 4% has been reported where free Wi-Fi is offered. More importantly it provides a springboard for cost-reducing applications, such as train diagnostics, condition monitoring, wireless ticketing and service information. While this mantra has been regularly recited in prior years, it is only now that the market is reaching maturity with equipment standardization, wider availability of 3G and 4G wireless broadband networks, proven business models, and customer uptake.

CCJPA’s Jim Allison was quick to point out that the TOC is much more interested in the service than the box, something vendors too close to their products fail to fully understand when pitching. CCJPA recently received $3.75 million in funding towards the deployment of wireless Internet aboard the Capitol Corridor and San Joaquin fleets servicing the Bay Area, Sacramento and the Central Valley – the third busiest service in the Amtrak system. The technology, supplied by UK-based Nomad Digital, will roll out during 2011 and satisfy the demand for free Wi-Fi, the No. 1  amenity requested by passengers. Allison emphasized the fact that the potential uses of a wireless network to the train are multi-disciplinary and require a TOC to engage people across its organization such as Marketing, Operations, Engineering and Maintenance who can assess and plan how to leverage wireless connectivity for their specific needs. That same cross-section of expertise will also help in the procurement process and evaluation of solutions.

CCJPA has conducted in-depth modeling of backhaul bandwidth demand along the Capitol Corridor route between San Jose and Sacramento, estimating the average and maximum demand based on passenger count and service uptake (see Figure 1).

Figure 1 – Bandwidth Demand on Amtrak Capitol Corridor Service [Source: CCJPA]

This modeling enabled CCJPA to plan the minimum backhaul required for connecting a train to the Internet, higlighting the kind of capacity needed for passenger Wi-Fi before taking into account other operational uses. The result was a system design by Nomad that utilizes multiple concurrent cellular connections, aggregated at packet level into one fat pipe capable of meeting CCJPA’s requirements. While delivering 3-4Mbps to a train in the era of 4G may seem trivial, but like many intercity services the Capitol Corridor route passes through distinctly rural areas including wetlands and farm land where 4G is not present; multiple, slower 3G WCDMA and CDMA networks need to be combined to deliver the necessary capacity. The system will use per user rate limiting and other methods of traffic shaping to share the available bandwidth fairly between passengers. CCJPA expects the free Wi-Fi service to be hugely popular with its customers, and initial research that predicted a 1 to 2% inducement of ridership – i.e. increased ticket sales due to the presence of free Wi-Fi – has been born out by live deployments. Allison believes that ultimately the business model that would work for most TOCs will be a hybrid of induced sales, advertising and operational savings.

Amtrak confirmed Allison’s expectations of Wi-Fi popularity; Lenetta McCampbell, Amtrak’s senior director of Onboard Systems with overall responsibility for their national Wi-Fi program, made clear that Wi-Fi was considered a central part of Amtrak’s product offering. The technology would, she said, place Amtrak in a more competitive position and contribute to increasing incremental revenue and ridership, while providing a communications backbone on trains for future passenger and business applications. Since the launch of free Wi-Fi on the Acela service between Boston and Washington, D.C., in March 2010, Amtrak has seen an astonishing 47% uptake among its passengers; that’s up from 35% in 2010. More than 130,000 users access the system from more than 250,000 devices every month, illustrating that many passengers have more than one IP-based device with Wi-Fi – be it smartphone, tablet or laptop. Thanks to effective marketing, 80% of Acela customers were aware that Wi-Fi was available prior to traveling, while 89% of Acela customers said that onboard Wi-Fi service added value to the Amtrak trip experience. This is despite the fact that some passengers had found ways to bypass built-in blocking mechanisms to limit video streaming and large downloads, said McCampbell, and Amtrak is implementing a fair usage policy to tackle this. To cater for demand, Amtrak is also augmenting available bandwidth by adding Wi-Fi at stations backhauled over wired networks with throughput of up to 100 Mbps. This will enable a true broadband experience for passengers at locations with high boarding volumes, and where cellular signals are restricted inside buildings such as Penn Station.

Figure 2 – Wi-Fi Benefits [Source: Amtrak]

Learning from the Acela experience, Amtrak now has a better long-term view of service improvements such as a move to LTE for backhaul in some regions by 2013, and of leveraging the wireless service for generating advertising revenues and delivering passenger information. The national Wi-Fi roll-out commenced in 2011 with systems being installed on a further 621 rail cars, which will lead to coverage of 70% of Amtrak’s ridership with a common experience on every train. Ultimately, said McCampbell, it is Amtrak’s desire to help establish a North American Wi-Fi Usage Policy that create a common standard for reporting of key performance indicators, system functionality such as fair usage and rate limiting, and “a shared set of priorities [among transportation agencies] to help vendors focus their efforts and resources.”

It’s clear that while free Wi-Fi is a driver, many TOCs are looking far beyond basic Internet connectivity for passengers. Cor ven der Hoop of Dutch railway provider NS Trains shared the progress his company is making with its On Board Information Services, or ORBIS. The GPS-based system delivers real-time information via multimedia, including in-train screens, the Wi-Fi hotspot landing page, and on train-side displays (see Figure 3).

Figure 3 – ORBIS System Topology [Source: NS Trains]

The system is deployed on around 100 trains today serving more than 225,000 passengers daily, with a goal of equipping almost 400 trains by the end of 2013 and reaching NS’s daily ridership of more than 625,000 passengers. NS has been providing Internet access to passengers for some time in partnership with T-Mobile and has seen a 7 to 10% uptake among passengers, with an average session time of 40 minutes and around 10MB download traffic per session.

Henry Hyde-Thomson of on-train systems provider 21Net announced a recent $10.5 million round of funding for his company led by Innovacom, the VC arm of France Telecom. Net21 outlined their IPTV service for high speed trains using a combination of cellular and satellite technologies, and which is being deployed by new Italian TOC NTV to deliver real-time news, sports and TV from SkyItalia. The solution will be integrated into 25 all-new Alstom AGV trains that will feature an impressive Cinema Car with multiple 19” screens, in-seat audio and personal 9” touchscreens.  SJ, Sweden’s state-owned rail provider, also plans to offer infotainment services onboard its trains, although using server-based media located on the train rather that using satellite-based TV services.

Paul Brindley, commercial director of Heathrow Express (HEx), provided a compelling holistic approach to the use of digital media to drive business. HEx is a rail service between London Paddington Station and Heathrow Airport. At just 15 minutes the journey is short yet the TOC has been offering free (originally paid) Wi-Fi to its 5.5 million annual travelers since March 2007, and sees almost 250,000 users a month. Despite such amenities, the TOC had seen declining ridership from 2006 to 2009. To turn this around, HEx embarked on a radical rethink of how to understand, communicate with, and sell to its customers through service innovation and technology. By combining traditional and digital marketing with focused customer relationship management (CRM), HEx was able to decisively reverse the trend, resulting in rapid ridership growth from 2009 to the present. Putting this in perspective, HEx has seen earnings (EBITDA) go from 5% average year-on-year growth between 2004 and 2008, to 49% growth between 2009 and 2011. Brindley puts this down to understanding the effectiveness of what he calls ‘integrated digital communications,’ and of which passenger Wi-Fi is a small but key element.

Figure 4 – Integrated Digital Communications [Source: HEx]

This year’s TrainComms conference not only benefitted from the spectacular surroundings of the St. Pancras Renaissance Hotel but also from the maturity that the wireless rail sector appears to have reached. Rather than this being a green field market in which the naturally cautious TOCs are tiptoeing toward pilots, there was a distinct feeling that it’s over the hump and into a deployment expansion phase with business models validated and technologies improved. Smaller rail and mass transit operators should take heed that now may be the time to join the party.

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Jim Baker is CEO at Xentrans Inc., a wireless project management consultancy based in San Francisco and London. A C-level wireless industry veteran, Baker has been involved in many deployments of wireless technologies on passenger transportation worldwide and is a recognized industry expert on Wi-Fi, 3G and 4G convergence. He is chair of the Technology Committee at the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications that is developing a strategic plan for implementation of wireless technologies in mass transit. Contact Baker via LinkedIn or follow him on Twitter.

Back in August 2010, Unwired covered the Department of Transport (DOT) IntelliDrive initiative that plans to create a wireless network to connect vehicles, municipal infrastructure and consumer hand-held devices using dedicated short-range communications (DSRC) in the 5.9GHz band. There has been disappointingly little progress toward widespread adoption of DSRC in the 10 years since the spectrum was allocated for intelligent transportation (ITS) applications. Pilots and schemes rolled out by regional authorities have focused on collision avoidance and fare collection, but failed to ignite an explosion of innovative ideas within the developer community. The diagram below shows the DOT’s original vision of DSRC used between vehicular and roadside systems within the National ITS Communications Architecture – dry stuff to be sure.

Figure 1 – DOT National ITS Communications Architecture (2004)

Great Ideas, Come On Down!
So it was good news for IntelliDrive when the DOT announced the Connected Vehicle Technology Challenge in January, inviting the general public to submit smart ideas for how DSRC could improve transportation. The competition closed to submissions on May 1st and judging will continue through the end of June. In true American Idol tradition, voting is open to the public until the end of May although the DOT has neither revealed who the final judges are (other than describing them as a ‘panel of experts from the DOT’s Intelligent Transportation Systems Program’) nor whether the public voting results will influence their decisions. It might have been preferable for some outside influence from, say, technology entrepreneurs who have real-world experience of converting innovative concepts to business reality – not something Big Government is known for. Regardless, six winners will be chosen and later honored at the 2011 World Congress on Intelligent Transportation Systems in Orlando, Fla., in October where they’ll have a chance to present their winning ideas and hopefully attract commercial interest; there are no cash prizes or promise of grant funds. Without proper financial backing to potentially transition the winning submissions from paper to real product, the whole competition seems rather pointless. One can’t help but think that the DOT would have been smarter to partner with a university innovation cluster, business incubator, VC or group of high net worth individuals to dangle the prospect of funding and commercial development to successful participants. But hey, they’ll pay for your hotel and happy meals at Disneyland so quit complaining.

A total of 77 submissions were received by the deadline; an impressive turnout. Looking through them, they essentially break down into the following categories:

The most popular categories were Driver Alert Warning systems (18%), and concepts for wireless systems network architecture (17%). While ideas for using DSRC for Collision Avoidance accounted for just 4% of entries, one from Howard University garnered 56 votes from the public (most entries have less than five votes each).

Where’s Transit?
Interestingly, ideas related to transit made up just 2.5% of the total entries with two lone submissions on how DSRC might improve passenger transportation. The first – a joint entry from DKS Associates and King County Metro, Wash., – examined whether an existing ITS network built by King County in the 4.9MGz public safety band satisfied the DOT’s vision of an all-encompassing wireless network despite not operating in the mandated 5.9GHz DRSC frequency and thus not currently being interoperable with future systems developed in that band. King County outlined that it chose 4.9GHz due to the ready availability of spectrum and equipment during the design phase in 2007-2008, and interoperability with public safety organizations, including law enforcement. Unlike DSRC, 4.9GHz is a well-accepted standard in common use today. Nevertheless King County recognized the importance of long-term interoperability with DSRC, and how a modular system such as the one they’ve deployed could be upgraded to support 5.9GHz radios alongside existing 4.9GHz, acting as a bridge between two unified technologies. The authors, John Toone and Bryan Nace, made a good case for how their deployment embraced ‘the best principles of both the US DOT IntelliDrive and the DHS/FCC Public Safety goals.’

Figure 2 – King County Transit ITS Architecture (2011)

The second transit-oriented submission from a group at Texas A&M University examined how DSRC could be implemented to create an ad-hoc wireless network between transit vehicles, passengers and pedestrians to exchange real-time transit information, while factoring in data such as passenger counts on buses and trains. The authors argued that a decentralized DSRC-based system would provide more accurate and timely information than existing solutions such as smart phone apps, while adding a layer of real-time interactivity for trip planning, vehicle rerouting, and service query. With on-board wireless systems becoming increasingly common in buses and trains for AVL, passenger Wi-Fi and remote CCTV access, it’s not beyond the realm of possibility to add a DSRC-compliant 5.9GHz radio to interface with IntelliDrive applications such as that suggested by A&M, as long as the on-board systems are extensible and preferably open-source based.

DOT should be congratulated for encouraging the spirit of innovation with the Connected Vehicle Challenge. While it might have been more commercially driven, it has clearly stimulated ideas on how to implement DSRC in meaningful ways. Hopefully this will prompt CIOs within transit agencies to consider how wireless solutions they deploy today might evolve to interact with IntelliDrive solutions tomorrow.

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Jim Baker is CEO at Xentrans Inc., a wireless project management consultancy based in San Francisco and London. A C-level wireless industry veteran, Baker has been involved in many deployments of wireless technologies on passenger transportation worldwide and is a recognized industry expert on Wi-Fi, 3G and 4G convergence. He is chair of the Technology Committee at the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications [http://www.transitwireless.org] that is developing a strategic plan for implementation of wireless technologies in mass transit. Contact Baker via LinkedIn or follow him on Twitter.

Some years ago I was involved in building out a large wide area wireless network in the South East of the UK, delivering wireless broadband services to rural areas underserved by wireline technology such as DSL. Before any physical deployment could take place, it was vital to identify where multi-sector base stations had to be placed in order to provide sufficient RF coverage of the target areas, and how these locations could be linked together with point-to-point connections for backhaul. This RF coverage planning stage enables the network operator to understand infrastructure requirements in terms of location and cost, but also to predict throughput and capacity, and mitigate dead zones due to obstructions by landscape topography, buildings and dense seasonal foliage.

Transit operators are facing similar issues with a range of wireless initiatives including rebanding, narrowbanding and vehicle connectivity for Positive Train Control (PTC), passenger Internet and other needs. Accurate radio coverage planning on the desktop will help reduce deployment time and make more efficient use of budget. There are a number of vendors in this space who make the software systems required for wide area network, multi-frequency planning, including EDX , ATDI and AWE . Unwired caught up with Mark Chapman, CEO of EDX Wireless, at the recent IWCE conference in Las Vegas for an of outline how transit agencies can benefit from radio planning.

Unwired: What are some of the key challenges facing transit operators as they prepare for federally mandated wireless initiatives such as narrowbanding and PTC?

Chapman: One of the biggest challenges is ensuring that current network performance is maintained or improved as it is upgraded and expanded.  It is easy for an operator to overlook the importance of the planning stage of the project.  A good RF design will reduce project costs, minimize rework and ensure that network performance meets or exceeds objectives. A well-planned network will also use spectrum in an efficient manner, preserving this critical and increasingly scarce resource as rail networks expand.

Signal strength analysis along rail route

Unwired: What are the key functions of desktop radio planning software?

Chapman: Well, one of the key functions of radio planning software is to predict network performance before committing capital expense to a new network build or the expansion or modification of an existing network.  Radio planning software allows the engineer to visualize the effects of planned or proposed changes or additions to the network before the expensive civil works and electronics purchases are made.

It’s worth noting that the needs of an efficient Rail PTC system differ greatly from standard wireless solutions and require a different approach to planning and optimizing. These links are designed primarily for communication and control along a rail line, making the radio coverage and interference off the tracks or Right of Way less relevant to PTC operation.  For example EDX PTC tool SignalRT, concentrates calculations along the rail lines creating a high-resolution study that can be run more efficiently and quickly than a comparable study using conventional planning tools. The result is a more accurate representation of the interference, coverage and quality of RF service along the route of interest. The focus on the specific rail route, rather than an area, translates into more efficient use of scarce and valuable spectrum, higher performance, greater reliability and redundancy, and lower equipment costs.

Unwired: Can the same software be used for UHF/VHF narrowbanding, 800MHz rebanding, and trackside network design, for example at 5.8GHz?

Chapman: A good RF planning tool can allow the user to perform a wide variety of network simulations.  Most professional tools can predict radio network performance on a wide variety of networks that operate between 30 MHz and 100 GHz including Land Mobile analog and digital networks, PTC, cellular and other systems using area, route, link, mesh and multipoint studies and simulations.

Unwired: Where does ‘clutter’ data (representing obstructions to RF propagation such as topography and buildings) come from, and how accurate is it?

Chapman: Terrain and land use (“clutter”) is needed in RF modeling to provide accurate predictions of radio link performance.  The choice of clutter data depends on the project.  Network designs in rapidly growing densely populated areas need up-to-date high-resolution clutter data whereas rural areas that haven’t seen much development can be designed using older low-resolution clutter data that can be obtained for free, at least in the U.S., from the USGS website.  There are several vendors of high-resolution, high-quality clutter data.

Interestingly, one recent innovation is the use of Clutter Carving. This technique allows the use of easily obtainable digitized street and rail data to improve accuracy of predicted RF coverage by modeling RF transmission down the ‘canyons’ created by roads or rail lines through the ground clutter. Suited to both planning and deployment phases, Clutter Carving allows the use of low-cost, low-resolution clutter data while still giving accurate propagation predictions. The benefit is that a user can employ freely available data that better represents the propagation environment, thereby improving accuracy while lowering cost.

Unwired: Many transit operators are considering 4G networks for vehicle connectivity; how accurate are the coverage maps supplied by mobile carriers, and can desktop software be used to plan cellular coverage?

Chapman: The mobile carriers use sophisticated radio planning software to plan their network, but their publicly available network coverage maps tend to be a lower resolution historical snapshot of network coverage.  They can give an idea of how good the coverage is in an area, but it is unlikely they could be used to reliably plan a mission-critical system that would use the carrier’s network.

Unwired: How does radio planning take into account railway tunnels, and how much more is designing radio coverage in underground metro systems easier or more complex?

Chapman: Great question. Outdoor coverage is simpler to model.  Indoor and tunnel coverage requires more sophisticated models using more detailed building and tunnel databases.  Many planners choose to use a microcell/indoor models that can perform detailed analysis using ray tracing for indoor and tunnel radio coverage predictions. Ray tracing essentially considers all the various paths the signal can take including reflections etc., to build up a detailed model of performance. Obviously this is massively computationally challenging so part of our art is in developing mathematical ray tracing techniques which intelligently compute the performance in a way which allows the simulation to be run accurately even on a laptop.

Unwired: Does desktop software take into account differences between equipment vendors and radio/antenna types? If so, how?

Chapman: Depending on the engineering requirements, predictions can be made for generic transmitters, but more usually technology and vendor specific models are employed to predict actual performance. These models are built into the software or can be defined by the user if a particular vendor’s equipment is not supported. Most vendors are pretty good about publishing and sharing their data so it can be used in modeling software.

Unwired: How does radio planning help transit operators improve their return on investment?

Chapman: It is a lot cheaper to simulate a network in software before making the expensive upgrades.  Buying electronics and doing civil works is the expensive part of the project.  Radio planning software allows the engineer to do trade-off studies to ensure that the network is designed to meet or exceed design goals while saving expensive equipment. This process also allows “what-if” scenarios to be rapidly analyzed and simplifies the comparison of various architectures and vendor equipment and their effect on overall performance

In addition, a well-planned network will provide a higher degree of communication reliability and redundancy, increasing overall safety. Planning tools can determine the number of wireless servers that are available at any point along a route, essentially indicating what is available should a primary server fail. The combination of route analysis and clutter carving releases inefficiently used spectrum which can then be deployed to create additional back-up servers, offering an increased measure of resilience and redundancy. This is not strictly equipment ROI but certainly will be a factor if an operator is buying or licensing spectrum as well as building the network.

Unwired: What are some of the key differences when planning for voice traffic versus data?

Chapman: There is the simplistic approach of looking at only RF coverage that works for simpler FM types of networks.  But with digital systems carrying voice and data, the quality of service is equally, if not more important, to model. Most commercial RF planning software contains many specific tools and analysis studies to predict quality of service for digital systems as well as basis coverage.

Unwired: How does RF planning software account for in-building coverage of wide area networks?

Chapman: Buildings present quite an RF challenge as they are really good at absorbing RF. Many wireless network operators and planners now are considering an indoor to outdoor implementation process rather than trying to serve a building purely from an external system. This is particularly relevant as high-speed data service becomes important. As I mentioned before, if an operator has dedicated in-building systems then the Microcell/indoor Module and its sophisticated ray-tracing capability can accurately predict indoor coverage from indoor micro and pico cells, as well as the contribution and service from outdoor sites.

Unwired: Does RF planning help mitigate interference when designing network in unlicensed bands, such as 900MHz, 2.4GHz and 5GHz?

Chapman: Yes and no.  It is possible to predict the interference that your own network causes, but unlicensed bands are a “wild west” of a variety of RF sources that really need to be field-tested to ensure interference-free operation.

Unwired: Some transit operators want to use a combination of network types such as high-capacity Wi-Fi mesh in unlicensed bands for rail wayside video systems, and 3G/4G cellular for road vehicle connectivity. Will desktop software work with all types of network topology including multi-hop mesh?

Chapman: A comprehensive RF planning tool can allow the user to perform a wide variety of network simulations.  For example, EDX SignalPro can predict radio network performance on a wide variety of networks that operate between 30 MHz and 100 GHz, including Land Mobile analog and digital networks, PTC, cellular and other systems using area, route, link, mesh and multipoint studies and simulations. We also have a dedicated mesh Module that performs detailed mesh calculations on large scale networks.   This software is used for designing municipal Wi-Fi networks of a few hundred nodes up to large urban area Smart Grid AMI mesh systems with 100,000′s of nodes.

Multi-hop mesh network modeling in an urban environment.

Unwired: What key advice do you have regarding wireless network planning for CIOs and communication managers within transit organizations?

Chapman: Everything starts with planning so don’t try to save money by taking short cuts in the planning process. Wireless networks are complex, expensive and ever-changing systems, but with a proper focus on RF planning, operators will achieve higher performance and improved reliability with faster deployment, while benefiting from lower implementation and equipment costs.

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Jim Baker is managing partner at Xenventure, a market strategy and private equity firm based in San Francisco and London. A C-level wireless industry veteran, Baker has been involved in many deployments of wireless technologies on passenger transportation worldwide and is a recognized industry expert on Wi-Fi, 3G and 4G convergence. He is Chair of the Technology Committee at the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications which is developing a strategic plan for implementation of wireless technologies in mass transit. Contact Baker via LinkedIn or follow him on Twitter.

Arriving in Miami to attend the annual APTA TransITech conference this week, one of the first things I noticed outside my hotel was a local bus wrapped in graphics promoting on-board passenger Wi-Fi. Miami-Dade Transit (MDT) launched the free Wi-Fi service in late 2009 as part of the Wireless Miami-Dade County Initiative, a revitalization plan driven by Major Carlos Alvarez that includes free Wi-Fi in parks and on airport shuttles. To date, free Wi-Fi has been extended to the Metrobus 95 Express service, and four Metrorail commuter cars. According to the city, the Wi-Fi has been well received by transit customers with more than 100,000 unique users since the service was launched. Interestingly, the in-vehicle initiative has been paid for through a commercial partnership with AT&T rather than using public funds. So it was fitting then that this year’s TransITech conference should be held in a city where free Wi-Fi on transit is rapidly becoming the norm.

The relevance of broadband wireless, and the timing of its implementation, continues to be of significant importance to transit operators. Federal mandates are driving reexamination of spectrum utilization, and the migration paths offered by emerging technologies. On January 1st 2013, all business/industrial and public safety land mobile radio (LMR) systems that operate between 150-174MHz VHF and 421-512MHz UHF must stop using 25kHz ‘wideband’ channels and move to more efficient 12.5kHz ‘narrowband’. The process – appropriately known as Narrowbanding – “may be more costly and disruptive than expected” for transit agencies, according to Derek Brown, manager of ITS Practice at Macro Corporation . More importantly, agencies that have not already started down the narrowband transition path are rapidly running out of time to secure funding and implement a plan. “Access to money is prohibiting action,” continued Brown, warning that with only 20 months to go before the deadline just 25% of UHF licensees have migrated.

Narrowbanding is prompting transit operators to look closely at their radio technologies, and consider future applications that, more often than not, are driving the need for greater bandwidth than the tiny data channels within LMR systems provide. Questions such whether to redesign or completely replace legacy CAD/AVL systems, and whether to leave voice on narrowband and move data to higher capacity cellular networks are at the forefront of the agency CIO’s mind, according to Brown.

Wireless Technology Alternatives (source: Derek Brown, Macro)

If Narrowbanding is the catalyst for transit agencies to reexamine their wireless requirements, then understanding the possible applications for broadband – such as IP-CCTV, real-time AVL and passenger Wi-Fi – is paramount. According to Jim Allison, Manager of Planning at the Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Authority (CCJPA ) in Oakland CA, the relative scarcity of bandwidth means that being able to predict usage is key to a successful broadband implementation. CCJPA manages the intercity passenger train system in Northern California, serving commuters on a 170-mile route between San Jose and Sacramento. With ridership up 8% more than 2010 levels, CCJPA expects around 1.7 million trips on the service in FY 2011-12. According to the latest CCJPA business plan, in the same period the operator will spend under $4 million equipping its fleet with a free Wi-Fi service. “Intercity rail has greater demands on backhaul capacity,” explain Allison, citing the need for cellular network aggregation and packet-level load balancing to squeeze as much bandwidth as possible from multiple concurrent network connections across multiple providers.

Fortunately new 4G cellular technologies such as LTE are creating bigger pipes for demanding applications and heavy traffic. “LTE is already set to become the wireless broadband standard for mission-critical public safety applications, so it should be sufficiently capable for mass transit,” confirmed Alan Tilles, an attorney with Shulman, Rogers, Gandal, Pordy & Ecker of Potomac MD.

Clearly broadband implementation such as that described by CCJPA does not come cheap. But as Allison points out, a transit agency’s business model must show such a service is sustainable. While others have tried charging for Wi-Fi access, or hoped that advertising would foot the bill (both flawed approaches according to Allison), CCJPA has opted for the Induced Ticket Revenue model – in short, Wi-Fi must pull in more paying passengers. “A 1% increase in ticket sales should break even on CCJPA’s costs and 2% would put us in the black,” says Allison; a model born out by T-Systems in Germany and the Amtrak Acela service in the Northeastern United States. If correct, then this is a formulaic rule-of-thumb other transit authorities could use to gauge how much budget to apportion to passenger Wi-Fi initiatives.

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Jim Baker is CEO at Xentrans, Inc., a wireless project management consultancy based in San Francisco and London. A C-level wireless industry veteran, Baker has been involved in many deployments of wireless technologies on passenger transportation worldwide and is a recognized industry expert on Wi-Fi, 3G and 4G convergence. He is Chair of the Technology Committee at the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications that is developing a strategic plan for implementation of wireless technologies in mass transit. Contact Baker via LinkedIn or follow him on Twitter.

The 2008 Rail Safety Improvement Act requires that new positive train control (PTC) collision avoidance systems be deployed by railroad operators by the end of 2015, on all main lines used to transport passengers or materials that are hazardous through inhalation. Existing safety systems use spaced, track-side equipment to determine train location within a block of track, and a relatively simplistic colored-light notification system for drivers. PTC introduces continuous GPS-based location and speed tracking, with more sophisticated onboard wireless technology for enforcing movement authority from a centralized control center, wherever the vehicle may be. PTC will be inherently more reliable, and offer greater real-time functionality than conventional systems, and would prevent accidents such as the 2008 Chatsworth collision where a more advanced control system would have stopped the train automatically and lives saved.

Copyright ©2009 STI-CO From PTC Whitepaper, used with kind permission.

While the safety benefits of PTC are clear, rail operators cite concerns over timing, spectrum, radio equipment and overall cost – the latter expected to exceed $13 billion for installation and ongoing maintenance over the next 20 years. PTC legislation affects more than 70,000 miles of track and 17,000 locomotives, yet according to the Association of American Railroads (AAR), PTC implementation will yield just $1 of benefits for every $20 spent on it. AAR CEO Ed Hamberger does not mince words when it comes to PTC, stating last week that it was “a bad mandate,” but one that the U.S. Class 1 railroads were going “to live up to” by committing $12 billion in capital expenditures in 2011 alone. Nevertheless the AAR argues that while PTC may make trains safer, Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) claims of commercial benefits – such as cost reductions through increased rail line capacity and network velocity – are flawed. A 2010 study by Oliver Wyman on behalf of the AAR concluded that PTC offers minimal advantage over existing computer-aided dispatch (CAD) systems, for example, and contrary to FRA analysis provides no improvement to fuel economy, track maintenance or locomotive reliability. The AAR contends that safety enhancements using alternative technologies already underway by the rail industry would cost less and be equally effective, while freeing up much-needed budget for other environmental, infrastructure and service improvements. The FRA counters that while individual rail operators including Amtrak, BNSF and CSX had run various safety control schemes over the last two decades, by 2008 the railroad industry as a whole had failed to come up with a network-wide solution. Then Chatsworth happened, prompting the Rail Safety Improvement Act that made PTC a statutory requirement.

Despite their differences over the business model, negotiation between the AAR and the FRA has resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars being shaved off roll-out costs due to an agreed reduction in the number of route miles of track that must support PTC, based on revised future projections of hazardous material and passenger transportation. Meanwhile, the Department of Transportation is recommending that railroads not treat PTC as an ‘overlay’ on existing control systems, which would increase operating costs through duplication of infrastructure and maintenance costs. Instead, railroads should replace control systems “bringing PTC closer to cost neutrality” as outlined by the DOT’s Randolph Resor at the PTC World Congress in Miami in February.

In the meantime four Class 1 railroads (BNSF, CSX, Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern) have created an Interoperable Train Control Committee (ITC) to establish and develop PTC interoperability standards. The ITC will also work on hardware platforms for wayside, locomotive and base station technology, with a guide to installation best practices being developed by the American Railway Engineering and Maintenance-of-Way Association (AREMA) Committee 39 . The need for a clear-cut systems approach to PTC implementation cannot be exaggerated; this is well illustrated by Amtrak’s ACSES Project in the Northeastern Corridor. Originally built in three phases between 2000 and 2004, the project equipped six hundred trains and four hundred miles of track miles with next-generation safety communications systems. In order to meet the 2015 PTC deadline, Amtrak and integrator partner Alstom must expand PTC coverage to 1,600 track miles by 2012 and 4,600 miles by 2015, the latter stage requiring interoperability with four additional network operators and no less than eight commuter trail agencies.

One can see where the money goes. At last year’s Vancouver APTA conference Gerald Hanas, chair of APTA’s Commuter Rail Committee, called  for a phased approach to PTC roll-out as quite simply “the financial capacity for PTC may not be there” among regional commuter railroads. New York’s MTA Metro-North estimated its costs for PTC implementation would exceed $350 million, with neighboring Long Island Railroad (LIRR) costing a further $424 million. At the time MTA Metro-North President Howard Permut made clear that without significant new federal aid, funding PTC would divert money from other key infrastructure projects. He also expressed worry over the availability of sufficient radio spectrum and compliant equipment within such a tight timeline, concerns shared by many other transport industry leaders.

Despite the financial and technological challenges, agencies are moving ahead with PTC plans to meet the schedule. Last October, Parsons won a $120 million contract with the Southern California Regional Rail Authority (SCRRA) to deploy a PTC solution on the 512-mile Metrolink rail system, which will be interoperable with safety systems used by BNSF. Metrolink aims by 2012 to be the first railroad in the U.S. to fully deploy PTC, utilizing 220MHz spectrum, technology and infrastructure from a wide range of vendors including ARINC, Wabtec, Metercomm and Tower West Communications. Around 80 percent of the total cost of the project will be met by California state fund bonds, with a further $20m from the FRA and $18 million from the U.S. DOT Metrolink, the scene of the Chatsworth disaster, may well be the poster child for PTC implementation and act as an example of best practice for next-generation wireless safety systems on commuter rail.

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Jim Baker is CEO at Xentrans Inc., a wireless project management consultancy based in San Francisco and London. A C-level wireless industry veteran, Baker has been involved in many deployments of wireless technologies on passenger transportation worldwide and is a recognized industry expert on Wi-Fi, 3G and 4G convergence. He is chair of the Technology Committee at the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications that is developing a strategic plan for implementation of wireless technologies in mass transit. Contact Baker via LinkedIn or follow him on Twitter.

My diary is beginning to look pretty full with conference events over the next few months; the 2011 season is getting well underway. As I begin to pack my bags, I thought I’d take a moment to review what’s coming up at the intersection of the mass transit and wireless sectors during March, in an attempt to better understand how public transport is perceived and represented as a market opportunity in the wireless community.

IWCE 2011 – March 7-11, Las Vegas, Nev.

March kicks off with the annual International Wireless Communications Expo (IWCE) in sunny Las Vegas. Originally a two-way radio conference with its roots in public safety, IWCE has grown organically to include a wide range of topics, including WAN infrastructure, M2M, 4G technologies, Wi-Fi, and hot issues such as narrowbanding and 700MHz interoperability. Much of the event’s content is directly pertinent to mass transit, and several conference sessions are geared to this with speakers from agencies, including Portland’s TriMet and Santa Clara’s VTA:

3/9/11        3:00 p.m. – 4:15 p.m.
Wireless Communications Networks for Transportation Systems in the 21st Century

3/9/11        4:30 p.m. – 5:45 p.m.
Railroad and Public Transport Roundtable

3/10/11    10:00 a.m. – 11:10 a.m.
Regional Radio Systems: Collaborating Transit and Public Safety

3/11/11    11:10 a.m. – 12:10 a.m.
Next Steps in Effective Wireless Backhaul Network Transformation for Cities, Public Safety, Energy and Transportation

IWCE have created what could prove to be the most diverse and interesting wireless conference schedule for mass transit and public safety professionals this year. There are a number of sessions focusing on 700MHz, including a presentation on Emergency Response Interoperability Center (ERIC) and how its work will impact public safety and transportation markets. I wrote about ERIC and its lack of representation of transit agencies in a previous “Unwired” column. While this ruffled a few feather or two in Washington, it remains to be seen whether this session will address the issue. Fear not, “Unwired” will be there to ask probing questions.

If you’re attending IWCE, please do stop by the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications booth #4121 and say “Hi.” The Joint Council is also holding its quarterly meeting on Thursday March 10 between noon and 4 p.m.; if you’d like to attend and contribute, please sign up and become a member at no cost. In addition to presenting on one of the IWCE panels, I’ll be covering the event for “Mass Transit” magazine, so if you can’t make it you can read about it in a future “Unwired” column.

CTIA Wireless 2011 – March 22-24, Orlando, Fla.

The Wireless Association represents the international wireless telecommunications industry and holds its annual spring convention in Florida this month, with more than a thousand exhibitors and 40,000 attendees. In recent years, CTIA has moved swiftly to embrace emerging trends, including social media, mobile commerce and the driving force of smartphone applications. At the same time, it recognizes the importance of vertical markets such as M2M, smart energy and wireless health. At the recent San Francisco CTIA event last fall, I chaired a panel on intelligent transportation that looked at a wide range of transport-oriented topics, including passenger Wi-Fi, telematics, DSRC, and “social” navigation using apps like Waze . Sadly, at the time of writing, ITS as a session topic is missing from the Orlando program, and as a technology section of the exhibition floor. So while real-world case studies will not be discussed in a panel environment, several exhibitors in the M2M Pavillion, such as Eurotech and Sierra Wireless will be showing mobile technologies suitable for in-vehicle use.

Mass transit as a sector could do better by working with CTIA to explain its technical objectives, and encourage vendors to address these needs with viable wireless solutions. While there are events more geared to the transport industry, CTIA is the largest gathering of wireless professionals in the U.S., so it’s worth pursuing. APTA or AASHTO might want to consider outreach to CTIA to encourage specific ITS seminars or panels at future events.

APTA TransITech – March 29-31, Miami, Fla.

Hot on the heels of CTIA and not too distant, APTA holds its annual technology shindig in balmy downtown Miami at the end of the month. As you might expect, the conference sessions are all about transit, with several sessions focused on wireless:

3/29/11    1:15 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.
US DOT Connected Vehicles

3/30/11    100 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.
Wireless, Broadband and Narrowbanding

3/31/11    9:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m.
Information Technology ITS applications

3/31/11    10:15 a.m. – 11:45 a.m.
Transitioning from Legacy CAD/AVL

Transit agencies are well represented on almost every session, including Jim Allison of the Capitol Corridors Joint Powers Authority (and vice chair, Technology Committee of the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications) speaking on broadband in transit on March 30. “Unwired” will be attending and writing up the event for our early April column. With three large events in one month alone, 2011 is shaping up to be an active year for wireless in mass transit.

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Jim Baker is CEO at Xentrans Inc., a wireless project management consultancy based in San Francisco and London. A C-level wireless industry veteran, Baker has been involved in many deployments of wireless technologies on passenger transportation worldwide and is a recognized industry expert on Wi-Fi, 3G and 4G convergence. He is chair of the Technology Committee at the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications that is developing a strategic plan for implementation of wireless technologies in mass transit. Contact Baker via LinkedIn or follow him on Twitter.

In August 2010, the FCC invited nominations for participation in the Emergency Response Interoperability Center (ERIC) Public Safety Advisory Committee (PSAC). ERIC  was set up last April by the FCC to establish a technical and operational framework for interoperability of public safety networks using the 700MHz band, with input from the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Justice among others. The purpose of PSAC would be to recommend requirements and procedures for nationwide interoperability, security and reliability, as well as suggesting ways to strengthen collaboration between communication service providers and public safety entities for response procedures during emergencies. Given the important role that mass transit plays in secondary public safety response, it was clear to many that transit agencies should have a voice in PSAC.

It came as a surprise, then, that when the FCC announced earlier this month the list of 26 appointees to PSAC, they comprised mainly fire, police and state agencies, with just one representative from AASHTO and not one from a mass transit agency. And while AASHTO does a great job, it’s hardly the mouthpiece for the mass transit sector. During the nomination period both APTA and the CTAA wrote to the FCC to champion input from the passenger transportation community, and recommend appointees – unfortunately to no avail. Under more scrutiny, ERIC appears to have a track record of under-utilizing the opinion of transit; last June it appointed 19 members of its Technical Advisory Committee , with just one transit authority aboard – New York City Transit Authority – and no representation from potential contributors such as APTA’s Wireless Communications Subcommittee.

So what’s gone wrong? There’s no doubt that transit plays a vital role in public safety; terrorism often strikes at the heart of our day-to-day commute as horrifically illustrated by the bus and subway attacks in London in July 2005 that left 50 dead and hundreds injured, and by other attacks in Israel, Madrid, Moscow and Paris. Since 2001, more than 2,500 have been killed in outrages on rail and bus systems, and more than 10,000 injured. In many of these cases transit CCTV played a crucial role in how responders reacted, and how law enforcement later tracked and identified culprits. Meanwhile U.S. transit systems remain vulnerable and authorities are clearly concerned about copycat attacks here. A significant percentage of CCTV cameras in the United States are part of transit infrastructure; given the impetus behind getting live video feeds into first responders’ hands over wireless broadband networks, close collaboration on 700MHz utilization would appear to be essential.

Core to the issue is that the FCC defines ‘pubic safety service providers’ as police, fire and emergency medical first responders – ‘blue light’ services. Transportation operators (unless private) are classified as state or local government entities that “do not provide for the safety of life, health or property.” However transport bodies such as APTA and AASHTO strongly disagree with the FCC’s definition, believing that transit agencies obviously meet these requirements in the preparation for an emergency response and in the recovery from a disaster; without their help and participation, police, fire and medical teams simply could not respond effectively. Perhaps the FCC’s reluctance to permit meaningful participation by transit agencies in ERIC is the continued misguided belief that, in fact, transit is not worthy of being a public safety player.

Despite the FCC’s position, coordination on measures at 700MHz in spectrum specifically reserved for public safety applications makes sense. Such coordination today will mean a safer transportation environment tomorrow, and reduce emergency response times in the event of a disaster. APTA has been quick to point out that interoperability between radio systems, along with common infrastructure for supporting law enforcement resources, are key priorities for capital investment. Alas funding for transit police and upgrading of security systems is sparse – in fact “woefully below the levels we require,” according to Greg Hull, security director at APTA. As APTA President Bill Millar pointed out two years ago to the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security , between 2001 and 2009 the federal government spent nearly $30 billion on aviation security while allocating just $1.4 billion for transit security. APTA has tried hard to work with the Department of Homeland Security on public safety issues but cites “strained relationships” that result in “delays, deferrals and duplication of effort,” according to Millar. Despite outreach from APTA and CCTA, and efforts to participate in ERIC’s committees, it appears the FCC has only minutely opened the door and for reasons known only to that august body, remains hesitant to embrace the mass transit community when it comes to matters of public safety.

Fortunately it’s not all doom and gloom; wireless initiatives between public and private bodies are thriving and cooperation is positively encouraged. President Obama’s National Broadband Plan recommends efforts to improve utilization of existing communications infrastructure, and transit is already playing a role. In an industry where private sector roof rights are notoriously expensive and lengthy to acquire, service providers are encouraged to negotiate utilization of conduits and masts on transit agency property to reduce costs and ease deployment. An example of best practice is Clearwire and Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority, where the 4G service provider has been able to leverage agency communications infrastructure for 2.5GHz WiMAX base stations through a barter arrangement in exchange for wireless broadband services. This has led to a successful reduction in wireless OPEX for VTA in its efforts to deliver connectivity Wi-Fi Internet access to it fleet of light rail vehicles.

Once again it seems that the real wireless success stories are between private and non-government organizations, where collaboration is driven by commercial relationships with an ease and agility that is painfully absent between the FCC and transit.

Jim Baker is CEO at Xentrans Inc., a wireless project management consultancy based in San Francisco and London. A C-level wireless industry veteran, Baker has been involved in many deployments of wireless technologies on passenger transportation worldwide and is a recognized industry expert on Wi-Fi, 3G and 4G convergence. He is cChair of the Technology Committee at the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications that is developing a strategic plan for implementation of wireless technologies in mass transit. Contact Baker via LinkedIn.

Pay By Phone where you see this sign

Using your phone as a digital wallet is nothing new; Google has NFC technology in its Android phones, and Scandinavians have been able to pay at vending machines with certain models of Nokia phone for several years. Apple’s news is important because with the introduction of NFC in the next iPhone – which will sell in gazillions – the technology will have reached a tipping point that could lead to mass adoption by retailers and other merchants, including mass transit operators.

I’m not a stranger to NFC; my iPhone 4 has an NFC contactless payment sticker on its back (see photo) provided by Citibank, which allows me to make payments up to $50 by simply touching my phone to any in-store Mastercard PayPass terminal.

NFC-enabled iPhone using Mastercard PayPass

NFC – How It Works

NFC uses short-range RF-energized (RFID) tag technology at 13.56MHz with a normal operating range of a few inches. NFC tags are typically embedded in plastic cards or in key fobs, and payments under a certain value – say $20 – can be made via a contactless transaction without the need for a PIN or signature. A key difference between card and phone implementations is that the latter supports over-the-air (OTA) updates, such as topping up credit. Waving your phone near an NFC terminal, at a railway station turnstile for example, will initiate an authentication process with a back-office server that identifies you via the phone’s unique ID. At the end of your journey, a similar process at the exit turnstile enables the system to bill you the correct amount for the distance you’ve traveled. In flat-fee transactions, such as at a vending machine, the charge is debited right away. Billing might be made to a specified charge or debit card, or from a prepaid credit balance.

NFC compared with other wireless technologies. Source: NFC Forum

NFC is unlikely to conflict with other wireless technologies in the panoply of transit applications; its lower power and frequency limits it to a much shorter range than ZigBee or Bluetooth.

NFC in Mass Transit

NFC has already been successfully deployed in mass transit environments for transport ticketing, including the Oyster card by Transport for London’s (TfL) and the Octopus card in Hong Kong. While the Oyster card’s use is restricted to payment for ticketing, the Octopus card is an accepted form of payment for parking meters and in many Hong Kong retailers including 7-Eleven, Starbucks and McDonald’s. With over 34 million Oyster cards issued, 80% of all journeys on TfL’s London transport services are paid using the card, while in Hong Kong the Octopus card is used by 95% of the population. These are impressive figures and illustrate that NFC technology can be hugely successful in the public transport environment when backed with concerted effort. Not that it’s been easy sailing; in 2008 TfL canceled the original £100m ($158m) Oyster contract with its key suppliers five years early following a series of technical failures. A new contract was subsequently issued, no doubt with stricter conditions, which will see Oyster continue until at least 2013.

In the United States NFC pilot schemes have included San Francisco’s BART and Boston’s MBTA, both conducted in 2008. The four-month BART scheme, run in conjunction with Sprint and fast food outlet Jack in the Box, comprised over 200 people using the NFC-enabled Samsung SPH-A920M handset; 80% of the trialists considered the virtual wallet ‘easy to use’. A similar six-month pilot was conducted on the New York City Transit by Cingular (now AT&T) and Citigroup using an NFC-enabled Nokia 6131. Unlike the Oyster and Octopus rollouts, these limited trials tested mobile phones as the payment devices, using embedded NFC technology.

Visa has taken a different NFC approach in its payWave partnerships with New York City Transit, New Jersey Transit, and the Port Authority. Rather than using a separate card or NFC-embedded phone, the pilots will use an NFC microSD card from DeviceFidelity that is inserted in any phone with a microSD slot. Visa touts the New York trials as an example of how NFC is helping transit agencies get passengers “where they need to go quickly and efficiently”.

The Move from Card to Phone

The migration from the plastic card to the mobile phone is the key step in the mass adoption of NFC as an enabling technology. Contactless transactions can include transit and retail payments, as well as home applications such as security and sharing information between home electronics including computers and game consoles.

On the road to phone-only NFC devices there are some interesting hybrid solutions. Visa Europe’s iCarte ‘bridges’ NFC technologies by using an iPhone app in conjunction with an NFC accessory that fits on the bottom of the phone. This allows users to pay by phone for goods wherever Visa payWave is accepted. While the initial pilot is geographically limited to Turkey, Visa hopes to roll out in European markets following engagements with mobile carriers and banks. The UK is taking a more aggressive approach; this week its largest mobile group Everything Everywhere – the Orange and T-Mobile venture – announced an NFC roll out to over 40,000 checkouts by the summer of 2011. The company’s Chief Development Officer Gerry McQuade said that it was “the beginning of a revolution in how we pay for things”.

Back in the U.S. Starbucks has recently announced nationwide acceptance of payment by iPhone at its 6,800 stores, albeit using an app that displays a 2D barcode for scanning by an in-store optical reader. Starbucks is hoping the app will replace some of the plastic payment cards that account for 20% of all transactions in its coffee shops, but has not ruled out a migration to NFC when the technology has matured.

One challenge for widespread adoption of NFC outside of mass transit is the presence of NFC-capable terminals in the retail environment. Telefonica, the Spanish mobile operator and owner of UK operator O2, believes that London’s 2012 Olympic Games will be a driver for wider NFC roll out in the UK. According to Barclays, there are fewer than 45,000 contactless point-of-sale terminals in the UK today, but interest from Tesco and Boots, two of the UK’s largest retailers will increase deployments. Along with embedded NFC in its next iPhone and iPad, Apple is reported to be considering seeding retailers with heavily subsidized NFC terminals, while VISA is cutting contactless per transaction fees 50%, from 8p (12.6¢) to 4p (6.3¢). The increase in retail terminals and reduction in fees help pave the way for NFC to become a ubiquitous standardized technology.

NFC for Smart Urban Mobility

In mass transit, NFC-ready phones could precipitate a move away from just ‘smart ticketing’ to ‘smart urban mobility’ where the phone not only facilitates intermodal payments such as ticketing and retail shopping, but also provides traffic and timetable information, and geo-location services. The NFC Forum, a non-profit promoting near field interoperability, has published a white paper on the use of NFC in public transport. The paper offers an introduction to the potential uses, benefits, and setup of NFC technology in public transport programs, with examples of best practice and business models. The Forum is bullish of NFC’s impact in public transport, stating that in addition to operational efficiencies from faster passenger throughput, transit operators will benefit from “cost savings in eliminating equipment, ending…paper and plastic cards, and reducing cash handling” as well as “increased travel and retention”.

In late 2009, the UK’s Department of Transport concluded an eighteen-month research project into the use of NFC for public transportation ticketing. The DoT believes that smart ticketing could save over £2 billion ($3.1 billion) annually, and is the future of transport ticketing.

Speed & Security Concerns

NFC is not without its challenges; there have been technical concerns about the speed at which contactless devices can authenticate at transit system turnstiles, and whether NFC is inherently insecure. Agencies who have carried out NFC pilots argue that a device must have a transaction time of less than 500ms to be viable, and prevent passenger delays at turnstiles. NFC implementations that use secure applications embedded on SIM or microSD cards can suffer from increased transaction times, in some cases over a second. By putting NFC applications on embedded chips in the phones themselves, as found on Android phones and proposed next-generation iPhone, these transaction times are likely to be significantly reduced.

In 2008, the MiFare Classic chip found in Oyster cards and other public transport payment cards was hacked. As a result, agencies including TfL, switched their card-based NFC implementations to the more secure MiFare DESFire. Concerns about the security of NFC on phones have been raised by experts including McAfee, citing holes in the underlying operating system source code that might compromise NFC information – a problem already identified in version of Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS. Threats such as NFC eavesdropping remain a problem, but more comprehensive support for data encryption and tighter OS security should address these. The Open Standard for Public Transport (OSPT) Alliance has proposed an open security standard for ticketing called Cipurse, as an alternative to proprietary systems such as MiFare, specifically for transit environments.

What’s Next?

In the Harvard Business Review, Google Chairman and CEO Eric Schmidt was clear to point out that the company’s 2011 strategic objectives were “all about mobile”. By adding NFC support in the Android OS in December and acquiring Canadian NFC developer Zetawire at the same time, the behemoth’s plans are clear – to secure a lead in the mobile contactless payments space. With Apple following suit and other handset manufacturers certain to follow, 2011 will be a defining year in NFC market growth. It remains to be seen how fast this will translate to the transit industry, particularly in North America. We need to see an end to pilots and the start of more concrete commitment from transit agencies, mobile carriers and banks. ISIS – a joint venture by AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon – is a big step towards this. While the transit industry is not renowned for the speed at which it implements new technologies, NFC could just be the juggernaut it can’t ignore.

Jim Baker is CEO at Xentrans, Inc., a wireless project management consultancy based in San Francisco and London. A C-level wireless industry veteran, Baker has been involved in many deployments of wireless technologies on passenger transportation worldwide and is a recognized industry expert on Wi-Fi, 3G and 4G convergence. He is Chair of the Technology Committee at the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications [http://www.transitwireless.org] that is developing a strategic plan for implementation of wireless technologies in mass transit. Contact Baker via LinkedIn [http://www.linkedin.com/in/jnb65] or follow him on Twitter [http://www.twitter.com/jnb65].

Last week in Detroit, Sprint CEO Dan Hesse addressed the Detroit Economic Club explaining how Sprint intends to leverage its 3G and 4G wireless networks to bring ‘significant environmental, safety and operational benefits’ to the transportation industry. Through a Connected Transportation initiative, Hesse outlined a machine-to-machine (M2M) solutions strategy that would create products and services for mass transit operators and public safety organizations to improve driver performance, increase public safety and enhance fleet management logistics. By using such wireless technology, Hesse said, accident reduction of 5 percent in a 100-vehicle fleet could bring about six fewer accidents each year.

That’s a compelling argument for M2M, and to help develop such solutions Sprint has opened an M2M Collaboration Center in the San Francisco Bay Area to work with device manufacturers and applications developers, get products certified and bring them to market. Sprint cites Amtrak as being just one transport organization already working with the carrier on applications such as Wi-Fi and digital signage connected over 4G networks to improve the travel experience.

Connecting Vehicles

With the global mobile M2M market expected to reach $57 billion by 2014, Sprint is not the only carrier looking to get in on the action. Cisco agrees that M2M is ready for prime time, and that automotive and transportation applications are high on the list, pointing to initiatives like Telenor’s Connexion as a leading example. In Europe, Nissan Leaf owners will be able check the battery status and control certain functions of their parked cars from mobile phones, via the Telenor network. Telenor believes that growth in this sector will be assisted by EU legislation such the Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Directive 2010/40/EU which came into force in the fall of 2010, laying out a framework for deployment of road transport ITS solutions. It won’t be a fast path to implementation due to market complexity, warns Telenor’s Rémi Demerle, but legislation is what the industry needs to create a common EU standard for connected services to ground transport. The question remains whether a European standard would be adopted in North America. The GSM Association (GSMA) predicts that the worldwide penetration of telematics systems in vehicles will climb from less than 10 percent in 2010 to 23 percent in 2015; this can only be achieved with consensus among carriers and vendors on how that will be accomplished technically.

Not that all EU Connected Transportation ideas are good ones. In the news this week was the SARTRE project, which stands for Safe Road Trains for the Environment. The idea is that as you’re cruising along the freeway, your car can automatically join a convoy or ‘platoon’ where the lead vehicle takes control, and you sit back and enjoy a sandwich, take a nap, or — as I see it — end up in a god-awful raging fireball. I mean really, do you see this catching on in the U.S. say, on 405 in downtown L.A. during rush hour? No, didn’t think so. Volvo believes this will be the new way of traveling within ten years. Good luck with that.

Connecting Passengers

Regular readers will know that I often cover stories about Wi-Fi on passenger transport; I like to be connected on the train or bus, preferably on someone else’s nickel. The cost of deploying Wi-Fi on a fleet has dropped dramatically in recent years due to lower equipment costs, and overheads can be offset by a variety of business models. 2011 has got off to a good start with several transit agencies committing to public Wi-Fi on their vehicles. Los Angeles Metro issued a tender for the design and implementation requirements for Wi-Fi on the Metro Gold Line, which extends twenty miles between Pasadena and East Los Angeles and has a ridership of over 34,000 daily boardings. Issued by the Community Redevelopment Agency of Los Angeles (CRA/LA) it’s essentially an RFP for a consultant to write the final RFP, which CRA/LA hopes to issue by mid-year. Accordingly to consulting firm Senza Fili, which conducted an initial assessment of passenger Wi-Fi for CRA/LA in late 2008, additional ticket revenue resulting from a ridership increase of between 3-5% would be sufficient to cover both the initial CAPEX and ongoing operating expenses. Costs for an urban deployment can vary hugely depending on the technical approach; for example three years ago building a private trackside network using 5GHz WiMAX or Wi-Fi might have been the most sensible approach for delivering connectivity to a train full of eager Tweeters. But today, with the advent of 4G networks which are often quite dense in the urban core and capable of bursting to speeds in excess of 6-10Mbps, using commercial mobile networks becomes more of a viable option, particularly if you aggregate 4G carriers like Verizon and Sprint together to create a ‘bigger pipe’.

Proponents of trackside infrastructure often cite wireless CCTV and other bandwidth-hungry applications as justification of the cost and effort needed to build a network in the rail right-of-way (ROW). Tunnels can also pose a problem to 3G/4G cellular network coverage and Gold Line has several, including one almost two miles long. Interestingly in its tender CRA/LA has only specified passenger Wi-Fi as a requirement, and has around $1 million in grant funds to spend on the project.

Meanwhile in Montana, Michael Tree hopes to spend slightly less to bring Wi-Fi to his passengers. Freshly installed as General Manager of Missoula’s Mountain Line bus service, he’s on a mission to bring new technology to his fleet, and Wi-Fi is near the top of the list. Operating fixed-route and paratransit services with 19 vehicles over a 39 square mile area, Mountain Line has seen a 60 percent increase in ridership in the last 15 years. According to Tree, 2010 came to close with another significant uptick in ridership; over 72,000 boardings in December alone. Around 40 percent of Mountain Line passengers are commuters equipped with smartphones and the smarts to use them. Tree hopes to have Wi-Fi available by June, while also adding GPS tracking and an SMS-based arrival time notification service. Unwired noted that Mountain Line publishes its route and schedule data in GTFS format, and makes it available to developers online — a move other agencies should follow. Tree did not disclose funding sources for the Wi-Fi project in his interview with The Missoulian, and I forgot to ask him in the phone call we had, but I’ll circle back later in the year to see how the project is going.

Connecting Cameras

For many transit authorities, CCTV is a key driver for investing in wireless. Mesh vendor Firetide has had success around the world with connecting remote cameras over long distances, with enough capacity to support high-resolution video. Following successful deployments with Seoul Subway in 2009 and Mumbai Metro in 2010, the company has returned to Korea with an ambitious project to remotely monitor dams and deliver public Wi-Fi access along a 240-mile, four-river corridor.

Firetide CEO Bo Larsson expects transportation to be one of the fastest growing markets for wireless infrastructure used in video surveillance through 2014. While 4G is considered an option for remote video access, Larsson is quick to point out that a standard definition (SD) video feed needs 2-3Mbps of uplink bandwidth for continuous streaming, while 1080p HD video requires more than 5Mbps — not the type of capacity available on commercial 4G mobile networks.

In the Mumbai Metro project, Firetide mesh modes have been successfully delivering video over a 10Mbps network from trains traveling at 50MPH, while the company’s fixed mesh nodes can achieve speeds over 300Mbps outdoors using MIMO antenna technology for more ‘fiber-like’ performance. Firetide, along with other mesh infrastructure vendors such as Tropos and BelAir, offer more flexible alternatives to fiber and 4G with the ability to support multiple concurrent applications from moving vehicles.

Fancy a Date?

We really should stop meeting like this — in print I mean. There are a number of transport-oriented events coming up where you’ll likely find me and others from Mass Transit magazine, and you might just hear me speak on a panel or two. Here are a few to watch out for:

PTC World Congress, February 22-24, Miami FL

APTA TransITech, March 29-31, Miami FL

IWCE, March 9-11, Las Vegas NV

The first drink’s on you.

Jim Baker is CEO at Xentrans Inc., a wireless project management consultancy based in San Francisco and London and a consulting editor for Mass Transit magazine. A C-level wireless industry veteran, Baker has been involved in many deployments of wireless technologies on passenger transportation worldwide and is a recognized industry expert on Wi-Fi, 3G and 4G convergence. He is chair of the Technology Committee at the Joint Council on Transit Wireless Communications that is developing a strategic plan for implementation of wireless technologies in mass transit. Contact Baker via LinkedIn or follow him on Twitter.