English
Moovit announced it has added 5 million public transport stops worldwide to the app and increased the number of local editors who map out their own transport networks where public data is not readily available to 200,000. Japanese-speaking Moovit users are also now able to use the app as Moovit supports its 44th language.
The milestones bring Moovit closer to its vision of mapping the world’s entire public transport network, making travel smoother for commuters wherever they are, while simultaneously building the largest global repository of transport data that governments, urban planners and businesses can use to better prepare for a changing urban landscape.
According to the UN, over half (56.4%) of the world’s 7.6 billion population currently live in an urban area and of the 31 ‘megacities’ in the world (cities with 10 million inhabitants or more) 24 are located in less developed regions*. Without accurate public transport information, citizens in many developing areas are underserved by the transport data enjoyed by developed cities such as London, Paris or New York.
In places such as the UK, Moovit users enjoy full national coverage but it’s developing urban areas where Moovit’s growing crowdsourcing program of local editors, called Mooviters, are so valuable in contributing hyper-local transport information to be used by all. Examples of recent city additions thanks to the altruism of the community are detailed below:
Knoxville, Tennessee, U.S.A: Commuters had no journey planner for their transportation network until May 2015 when local resident Joseph Linzer mapped the entire city’s 1,243 bus stops on Moovit. Joseph regularly updates his city, and recently helped bring Moovit to the public transit riders of neighboring Clarksville and Murfreesboro, other cities previously not available on the public transportation app.
In Brazil: With its population of nearly one million, João Pessoa was the first city launched by the Mooviter Community in 2014. Local community member Vitor Rodrigo Dias led the effort and finished mapping 3,249 bus stops in less than two months. Vitor eventually became one of Moovit’s first Mooviter Ambassadors and continues to lead city mapping projects throughout Brazil.
In Turkey: In May 2017, Fatih Aktaş, who is 90 percent visually impaired, wanted to bring Moovit to the 332,000 residents of his city of Balikesir in central Turkey. He petitioned the city to share information about its public transit network online. Fatih then asked 20 friends to help map the routes and add the schedules to Moovit. Moovit Country Manager Busra Yurgun joined Fatih’s mapathon marathon and within a week all 60 lines operating in the city were added to Moovit. Fatih and his team continue to update the city’s information, and Fatih intends to join Moovit’s accessibility test groups for new in-app features that help people with disabilities.
UN-Habitat states that the current model of urbanisation is unsustainable with cities all over the world grossly unprepared for the challenges associated with urbanisation.** The planning of public transport using real time data is imperative to assist urbanisation, which is why Moovit’s mission to map out global public transport networks, making it the Wikipedia of transit, is so crucial.
The UITP also estimates in the EU alone 57.6 billion journeys are taken on public transport carrying an average of 185 million passengers every workday and globally over a third of all journeys to work every day are via public transport.*** Mapping out accurate, real time usage of transport networks has become vital for managing urban growth.
With over 2,000 cities in the pipeline and a new city being added every 15 hours to the app, Moovit’s crowdsourced approach to data collection is accelerating its goal of providing total global coverage wherever you are in the world. Moovit’s addition of Japanese as its 44th language will enable the world’s 128 million Japanese speakers to use the app, which is now available in more than 1,500 cities across 78 countries.
Nir Erez, Co-founder & CEO of Moovit said, “Our vision for Moovit from day one was to provide people all over the world with a simple and easy way to get around on public transport. As global population increases and pressures on cities grow, the Moovit team has been blown away by the level of engagement mapping out transit routes for fellow travellers.”
“We’re now taking Moovit’s treasure trove of transit data to local governments and city planners to help them better prepare for the future of urban mobility including the imminent arrival of autonomous and electric vehicles” Erez said.
Sources:
***The UITP
