District I Council – Old Town passed a resolution with a request to introduce an electronic passenger counting system in public transport vehicles. Councilors argue that such a solution would be very helpful during the coronavirus pandemic.
News from Gazeta Krakowska.PL (News site in Polish Language)
The new Lajkonik trams already have an electronic passenger counting system. Hence the idea to use it in other public transport vehicles in Krakow. This would help in these times of pandemic, where there are restrictions on the number of people who can ride trams and buses. One could display how many seats are available in vehicles
Jacek Balcewicz, the councilor from the District I Council – Old Town, initiator of the resolution in which councilors from the first District requested the Public Transport Board (Zarządu Transportu Publicznego) to implement an electronic passenger counting system in public transport.
How could this help?
“Such a system in trams and buses would also help a lot in creating timetables. Based on the data, it could be determined what number of vehicles is needed on given routes to meet passengers’ expectations” – adds Councillor Balcewicz. In his opinion, it is better to spend money once to install an electronic passenger counting system than to commission such tests every time.
“It should be borne in mind that manual counting of passengers by employees may be affected by an error. It is not always easy to accurately count the number of people getting on and off eg a tram when there are many passengers. For this, you still need to employ people controlling whether people to count passengers do it in accordance with the contract. Later, such results go to analysis, everything lasts a long time, and having data from electronic counting you can react faster” – emphasizes Councillor Balcewicz.
How could it help in the case of a pandemic?
In the justification of the resolution, the councilors from District I emphasized that the lack of a passenger counting system was apparent during the restrictions imposed by the fight against the Coronavirus pandemic. “It happened that the police intervened by ordering the number of passengers to leave the tram. In turn, passengers getting into the vehicle were not aware of exceeding the allowed limit, because no one informed them about it, and the individual counting of passengers inside during a short stop at the bus stop was practically impossible” – stressed councilors from District I.
How could it help the Municipal Transport Company – MPK?
“An efficient passenger counting system will also contribute to the rational management of rolling stock and substitution of vehicles with the capacity expected by passengers, and thus the rationalisation of the costs of public transport, which is a priority in the current budget situation.”
What do officials say?
At ZTP, we were told that they would “work out a position in this matter”.
In the Municipal Transport Company, which buys new trams and buses, they admit that some of these vehicles are already equipped with an electronic passenger counting system. Technically, this means that sensors are installed in the door that records how many people get in and out of the vehicle at a given stop.
“More than 120 buses are equipped with this type of system. As for trams, such a system is in new Lajkonik vehicles and one NGT6 tram” – informs Marek Gancarczyk, spokesman for MPK Kraków.
As for the new Lajkonik trams, 50 such vehicles are expected to reach Kraków – 35 this year and 15 in the first quarter of 2021. Six copies of Lajkonik have arrived so far (the seventh is on the way), and four are already driving on Krakow’s tracks.
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Yours always sincerly,
The Twisted Red LadyBug That Likes Public Transport in Krakow
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