Figure 5. Taxi service simulation in OpenGTS
By clicking on a specific pointer, a popup comes up that
tells us the state of that vehicle. This allows us to redirect
the nearest available taxi to its next customer. If more taxies
are available, again the one with the shortest route can be
selected. In the simulation the black pointer represents the
customer waiting for the taxi. The taxi number 2 is the
nearest one but we can see that it is in motion and thus not
available. By clicking on other nearby taxies it can be found
that the nearest (and the fastest) available taxi is number 3.
It can take faster roads and thus arrive to its customer faster
than others. When using OpenGTS system for redirection,
various savings can be accomplished:
- idling time of every taxi can be reduced to minimum;
- taxies arrive quicker to its customers;
- customers are transported to their destination by the
fastest route and therefor in lesser time;
- traffic jams can be avoided;
- number of taxi vehicles can be reduced because of the
smart redirection system and lesser idling time of every
vehicle;
- with smaller number of vehicles and their economic
usage overall gas consumption is reduced;
- if any taxi comes to a problem (et. mechanical
problem) an other taxi can be dispatched to take over its
area and customers if needed;
- security of all vehicles is better because at any time their
location is known to its owner
- overall quality of service is raised to a higher level.
In this simulation only a portion of OpenGTS possibilities
are used and the immediately the positive end results can be
seen. The same principal can be applied to, for example on
public transportation. Because OpenGTS supports different
kind of users, everybody could see where is their bus or
tram, we could choose what kind of transportation we want
to take depending on our destination and availability of
taxies, trams or busses.
Again it has to be mentioned, as the whole OpenGTS
system is open sourced, it can be altered to meet a specific
requirement. On the taxi service example, additional
information of the current taxi status (availability, arrival
time) or its current customer destination would
be very useful and relatively easy to implement. To make
the whole system even more advanced an integration with
google navigation system would be the best way to go.