Govt to introduce digitalised fare collection system in bus services [ Tritiyo Matra News ]

Govt to introduce digitalised fare collection system in bus services

Local April 18, 2017

Dhaka Transport Coordination Authority is going to introduce digitalised fare collection system for the commuters of the BRTC bus service in Dhaka city from next month.
Initially, the DTCA would introduce the system in 25 air-conditioned busses run by Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation on Abdullapur to Motijheel route through issuing an integrated circuit card namely
Rapid Pass, officials said.
The DTCA, BRTC and Japan International Cooperation Agency have signed a memorandum of understanding on April 11 to pilot the automation of fair using Rapid Pass system on the route.
The 14-month long pilot project titled ‘Establishment of clearing house for integrating transport ticketing system in Dhaka city area’ would be carried out under a technical cooperation of JICA.
The total project cost is Tk 390 million while JICA is providing Tk 285 million as technical assistance and the rest will be funded by the government.
The goal of the project is to improve the fare collection operation by introducing and implementing Rapid Pass system and to provide convenience of rapid pass for passengers as a part of ‘One Card for All Transports’.
‘We have selected the Abdullapur to Motijheel route for piloting the Rapid Pass system and the digital fare collection system will be introduced in other routes of the city gradually, Syed Ahmed, executive director of DTCA told New Age on Monday.
He said that the DTCA would start the programme in the second half of May with 50,000 Rapid Pass and the cards would be brought from Japan very soon.
The commuters would be able to use the Smart Cards (Rapid Pass) in all transports includes buses, metro rails and inland water transport in future, Syed said.
Some of the private companies have already expressed their interest to introduce the Rapid Pass in their buses on Abdullapur to Motijheel route, he said.
A commuter would have to pay Tk 400 to buy a Rapid Pass with a built-in balance of Tk 200, Syed said.
He also said that the DTCA would act as a clearing house which will process all Rapid Pass System transaction data and settlement of fares collected.
Earlier, under a pilot project, smart card namely SPASS was introduced in BRTC bus services in Dhaka and in commuter and Diesel Electric Multiple Unit-DEMU service of Bangladesh Railway but the project failed due to technical reasons, said people involved with the process.
‘We had introduced SPASS in BRTC air-conditioned buses on Abdullapur to Motijheel route in 2012 but the project was not successful due to some technical reasons,’ the BRTC chairman Md Mizanur Rahman said.
He said that the BRTC incurred losses as the system could not perform efficiently due to lack of real-time information of the IC card and inability of card reader machines.
Mizanur said following a bitter experience over the IC cards the government has adopted a strong supervision system in new Rapid Pass project and hopefully it will be successful.
Rapid passes would be used in all public transports -- Mass Rapid Transits, Bus Rapid Transits and services provided by Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation, Bangladesh Railway, Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Corporation and private bus operators, he said.
Under the Establishment of Clearing House for Integrating Transport Ticketing System in Dhaka City Area project, the DTCA has signed a contract with Dutch-Bangla Bank Limited for establishing a clearing house bank to coordinate the fare system of different transport companies and to recharge the IC cards, the BRTC chairman said.
Following the pilot phase of the project the BRTC would make a separate agreement with DTCA to continue the Rapid Pass programme, he added.