Comment by lb1lf | Hacker News Reader

Comment by lb1lf | Hacker News Reader

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The Schiphol app is one of the better ones, but then there are all the other airports...

Also, this issue is not limited to airports - there's lots and lots of integration to be done.

Say, if I want to take a bus in Bergen (Norway's #2 town, or, if you ask the locals, #1) - you need one app to find out which bus(es) to take, then another to buy a ticket. If you want to buy a ticket for the airport coach? Oh, you'll need another app for that. Actually, you'll need two, as there are two coach companies.

And, getting to Oslo, (#1, or, if you ask the people in Bergen - #2) you'll need another app if you want to take the shuttle train into town, then yet another for getting tickets once you transit to trams/buses in the city centre.

&c. If public transport companies could agree on a way of sharing payments, the market is more than ripe for unified apps for route planning and ticketing, at least on a national level. (Expecting standardization to cross borders is probably a bit of a stretch - and, unless you happen to live in, say, Liechtenstein with half a dozen countries within walking distance (yes, I exaggerate), not much of a concern, really.

Switzerland mostly does this. I can buy a time-limited ticket from any ticket vending machine which is valid within a certain area, for a certain amount of time, and I can then use that ticket on any bus, train or tram, regardless of company or how many changes I need to make. It's also valid for most cablecars and boats. It's completely changed the way I use public transport.

(You can actually use the ticket vending machine by the bus stop near my house to buy a ticket which can be used to go by bus from my house to Zürich station, then by express train from there to a station in the mountains, and then by bus up to a ski resort car park, and then by cable car from there to the resort proper, and then by chairlift from there to the top of the mountain, and then it's your ski pass for a day's skiing, and then it takes you home again. One ticket.)

The situation in Norway seems needlessly complicated. The Netherlands does this. You can use the Ov-Chipkaart which is the access pass to all transportation services no matter who they are operated by.

We also have apps like 9292 or NS Reisplanner that combine trains, trams, buses, and metros into one route planner. The fact that you can use the Chipkaart for practically all land transportation is also amazingly convenient.

But then again with the OV card you'll have to check out and in again if you transfer and your train changes color (/operator)

I agree that the fragmentation is a hassle to deal with. There's something missing in terms of incentives to integrate all of these systems. Some major regions don't even provide transit metadata to Google Maps (e.g. Austrian ÖBB refuses[1], IIRC because Google didn't handle some types of transfer or some other feature which their own route planner does support). And that's before talking about booking tickets accepting payments.

I started writing out the list of steps I go through to visit a new city effectively, but it's much too depressing. There's a huge amount of local knowledge that IMO shouldn't be required just to visit a city as an outsider without getting ripped off.

[1] https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/maps/aPWIrf6H...

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