Flow Map Manager

Abstract

Long-distance bus companies, operate services along routes which have a flow of passengers. Along a route some passengers will leave the bus while others join. To monitor demand sufficiently well a tool is required which can help estimate the number of buses per route and their frequency. This paper describes one such tool, Bus Flow Manager, which was created as a Rich Client Platform using the uDIG plug-in with the Eclipse Java Integrated Development Environment (IDE). Bus Flow Manager provides a graphical interface showing a map with bus stops, and functionality to create passenger-flow maps. The passenger- flow maps will be created dynamically for each user request. The user request contains the date of the journey and optional values such as bus number and route number. Bus Flow Manager will help bus company staff manage resources more efficiently. The flow maps represent the values of the actual load of passengers and the available seating capacity for each leg of the journey. This information helps to quickly identify visually where and when it would be appropriate to add a new bus to the line or remove a bus from a line.