Taichung City’s smart transportation has achieved another breakthrough! The Ministry of Transportation announced the 2024 “Transportation Data Exchange Service Platform (TDX) Affiliate Unit Performance Evaluation Awards.” The Taichung City Government Transportation Bureau established the most comprehensive nationwide electronic ticketing operation rules, enhancing the real-time and early-warning road information service capabilities. It was honored with two awards: Excellence Award in the Ticketing Group – Bus Category and Excellence Award in the Road Incident Group.

Transportation Bureau Director Yeh Chao-Fu presented the awards at the city government meeting today (20th), sharing the glory with Mayor Lu Shiow-Yen and Taichung’s 2.86 million residents. The bureau will continue to strengthen the integration of public transportation information to provide the public with the highest quality smart services.

Mayor Lu praised the Transportation Bureau’s efforts and the results that benefit all citizens. Director Yeh especially thanked the Taichung Bus Joint Operation Management Committee for establishing the nation’s most complete electronic ticketing operation rules and the cooperation of 14 bus operators. Their efforts, ranging from daily equipment maintenance to backend data verification, have accumulated fundamental strength in bus ticketing data, making Taichung’s pioneering planning a new benchmark in bus operations.

Director Yeh stated that Mayor Lu values citizens’ transportation experience and has expanded smart transportation services to create a “citizen-perceptible” smart transport environment. Taichung has become a leader among smart transportation cities. Since the launch of the electronic ticketing system in 2004 (Year 93 in ROC calendar), Taichung planned to adopt a “distance-based fare system requiring card swipe on boarding and alighting.” Although initially questioned by some citizens for the convenience of swiping both times, long-term implementation has helped accurately capture trip data. This experience has been shared with other counties and cities, and recently many localities nationwide have switched to swiping both on boarding and alighting to better track trip data.

“The Transportation Bureau actively cooperates with the Ministry of Transportation in promoting smart transport policies and participates in public transport data integration services,” Director Yeh pointed out. In addition to receiving recognition from the central government for comprehensive bus dynamic information and ticketing data, the city government also demonstrated achievements in smart transportation in road conditions, road incidents, and construction information. This includes comprehensive updates of road connection sources, enhancing the service capability for real-time early warning road information. This enables the public to grasp road conditions instantly and plan the best routes ahead of time, shortening travel time and improving traffic flow. Taichung won the Excellence Award in the competitive “Road Incident” category of the TDX Affiliate Unit Performance Evaluation.

Director Yeh explained that the Ministry of Transportation’s “Transportation Data Exchange Service Platform (TDX)” collects nationwide traffic data used to analyze public transport characteristics and promotes diverse development and innovation of value-added services by the public and private sectors. The Transportation Bureau has provided basic data including 235 bus routes and stops in Taichung City, daily operation timetables, and route fares. This is supplemented by real-time bus dynamic system data and supervision of 14 operators to upload ticketing data to the platform for use by the Ministry of Transportation, academic institutions, and other units for various data applications and analyses.

The Transportation Bureau stated that “big data analysis applications” assist the development trend of smart transportation. The bureau will continue to upload and update public transport and fare ticketing data as designated by the Ministry of Transportation to ensure the TDX platform’s integrated data is more accurate and complete. This will facilitate proper utilization by industry, government, academia, and research institutions for research and development, promoting Taiwan’s smart transportation towards a new frontier.