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Introducing Optimization Insights: Take the guesswork out of operational decisions

Optimization Insights revolutionizes how agencies fine tune performance and rider experience for paratransit and microtransit operations.


Terri Ling

As an operations manager, your day involves gearing up for service, collaborating with dispatch teams and schedulers to harmonize system efficiency and rider satisfaction. Each day presents fresh challenges, and it’s hard to hit the perfect balance.

We get it. Having run our own transit services, and assisted over 100 partners in delivering reliable, accessible transit services to millions each year, we've experienced these challenges first-hand.

Striking the perfect balance between rider experience and system efficiency can often feel like a high-stakes game of trial and error. Months of adjustments may leave you feeling like you're navigating blind, with critical questions lingering, such as "If I increase pooling to 40%, what impact will that have on deadhead, passengers per vehicle hour and on-time performance?"

But what if you could predict the impact of even the smallest changes in your operation? Better yet, what if you could harness the power of your data to confidently make these changes, then observe how the improvements unfold in real-time?

We believe that this is the future.

Today, we're thrilled to unveil an innovative feature that's revolutionized how we and our customers optimize transportation systems.

Introducing Optimization Insights

We’re introducing Optimization Insights, a transformative simulation tool that empowers agencies to fine tune system performance and rider experience using historical data. With Optimization Insights, you can analyze how different service and fleet adjustments impact both past and future performance, promoting quicker, more confident data-driven decision-making.

At the heart of Optimization Insights is the ability to utilize historical data to replay any day's routing optimization. The system gathers past data about duties and requests while incorporating changes to service settings, fleet arrangements, duty schedules and boarding times. This allows agencies to answer questions like, "If I removed 5% of my vehicles last Thursday, how would that affect Passengers Per Vehicle Hour and On-Time Performance?”

With Optimization Insights, speculation is a thing of the past. This tool empowers operators, paving the way for tangible enhancements in their transit systems by turning data into actionable insights. Hindsight is indeed 2020.

The value of Optimization Insights for your agency

→ Optimize duty schedules to lower costs

Transit services operate under tight constraints. Many of our partners strive to maximize output with limited resources. It's crucial to make every resource count, but pinpointing where to adjust capacity and implementing those changes can be a daunting task. Any misstep can lead to wasted resources or disrupt the rider experience.

That's where Optimization Insights offers a lifeline. With Optimization Insights, operators gain an instant understanding of which duties to reduce and which to maintain for optimal efficiency. This empowers them to make informed decisions swiftly, enhancing operations while prioritizing rider satisfaction.

→ Optimize boarding and alighting times

Riders with mobility aids often require additional time to board vehicles. Spare's system intuitively factors this time into routing, but determining the optimal timeframe can pose a challenge. Underestimate it, and you risk undermining on-time performance. Overestimate it, and the number of passengers per vehicle hour drops. With Optimization Insights, operators can experiment with new boarding and alighting times. It’s effortless too—under the Services Tab, base boarding and alighting times (in seconds) can be adjusted for any previous day. The tool goes one step further to allow operators to configure the timing for each aid like oversized wheelchairs, service animals, bikes or more.

→ Find the right amount of pooling

With Spare's platform, agencies can fine-tune the balance between rider wait times and detour times for each fleet. Lower wait times can boost on-time performance, promote pooling, and minimize deadhead, but it might mean more stops for your riders.

That's where Optimization Insights comes in. This tool allows agencies to quantify the repercussions of these adjustments, like how increased pooling impacts detour times. Simply head to the Fleets Tab, move the sliders to align with your agency's targets, and simulate the passenger experience.

These adjustments essentially guide the Spare Engine on how to optimize your service, customizing your transit system to perfectly fit your unique objectives.

Harness the power of Optimization Insights

With Optimization Insights, Spare customers can unlock new levels of efficiency, strike the perfect balance between rider experience and operational effectiveness, and ultimately transform their transportation networks into seamless, sustainable, and thriving ecosystems.

Experience the power of Optimization Insights today and unlock the true potential of your transportation system with Spare. Reach out to your Spare representative to learn more about this feature and our Optimization Package, or schedule a demo with us today to see for yourself!