By YOURI KEMP
Tribune Business Reporter
ykemp@tribunemedia.net
THE dispatch centre that will play a key role in efforts to unify New Providence’s jitney system is expected to be unveiled within the next month, it was confirmed yesterday.
John Bridgewater, Bluestone Labs chief executive, told Tribune Business that the bus unification project has a projected summer deadline for full completion. “We had been hit with a delay in terms of implementing the devices. But the software has been much completed. The dispatch centre is about two to three weeks out,” he said.
“The only thing left is adding that physical component, so persons would be able to scan their QR code once booked. We are working diligently to get it up as fast as soon as possible.” Supply chain backlogs with third party vendors have threatened the project’s timelines, but the team is being “patient” in its approach to the system’s roll-out.
“We’ll definitely be up and running by summer time. We will do the first unveiling of the dispatch centre, and it will be a sequence of these unveilings as we start to bring a number of the different components that makes it a real bus system online,” Mr Bridgewater said.
“These things are massive in terms of their infrastructure. There’s so many moving pieces to these kinds of projects and co-ordination is what brings them to fruition. When you look at anywhere else in the world, these types of things happen and a massive effort takes a lot of co-ordination.”
Speaking for the drivers, Harrison Moxey, the United Public Transportation Company’s (UPTC) president, said: “We will soon be sending some stuff out to tender and some notices for the drivers. The network isn’t up and running now, but all of that will be coming into play the same time as the dispatch centre is completed and fully outfitted.
“The office is really critical before we get anything operating for the bus drivers. We will be getting some quotes in for the cameras and all of that stuff, so we are lining things up.”
The pilot programme for the bus unification programme was launched in 2017, but the initiative has undergone several changes since it was first developed. For example, previous plans did not fully account for the difficulties in organising all of the various franchise owners into one single entity. In addition, the pilot did not use a bus tracking system but a dispatch system, which is a new dynamic in the project involving the UPTC and Bluestone Labs.
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