Overtourism, the Made in Italy software platform for on-demand local public transport management arrives

Ferragosto arrives and the overtourism alarm returns. Cities of art, seaside resorts and mountain villages throughout Italy are taken by storm by crowds of tourists who, increasingly often, risk negatively affecting the quality of life of residents and also the legitimate expectations of visitors. Against the dangers of tourist overcrowding, new information technologies and even artificial intelligence come to the rescue.

A made-in-Italy solution is Personalbus, the software platform for managing local public transport on-demand: it is an app that enables the management of local mobility services based on the specific needs of the public. In practice, the individual tourist or family on holiday will no longer have to get stuck in a traffic jam and fight for a parking space to get to or from the location where they intend to stay, but will be able to leave their car in less congested areas and be picked up by buses provided by the local authorities, easily requesting the service via their mobile phone only when they are needed and at the cost of the normal ticket.

"Overtourism is a problem that recurs every summer and that puts both local administrations and the many Italians eager to enjoy their well-deserved holidays in the most beautiful places on our peninsula in serious difficulty," explains Marco Montangero, head of the Personalbus Business Unit for Bluecube, the Milan-based company that runs this app. "Our Personalbus platform represents a simple and effective solution, as well as an economical one: the city bus network is supplemented by a sophisticated computer system - which will soon also be equipped with artificial intelligence solutions - providing tourists with an on-demand public transport service and reducing the pressure of private traffic on the road network in small towns by the sea and in the mountains or in the historic centres of cities of art".

In short, Personalbus allows bus fleets to be managed according to passenger demand, with variable routes optimised according to bookings. The platform has four main components: first, the interface for the user, who can autonomously book the transport service with his or her mobile phone via a simple app; then a second interface for the drivers, who use an in-vehicle tablet to manage routes and rides; in addition, there is an 'autoplanner' that allows fully automated management of the booking cycle, from the user's request to the assignment of the ride; and finally there is an operations console, which allows public transport companies to manage and control the fleet of vehicles dedicated to DRT in real time.

Currently, Personalbus has the largest portfolio of installations in Italy and abroad, including public, private and public-private customers. Among other things, this platform is already in use in large cities such as Genoa, Milan and Cagliari, in the Aosta Valley and abroad in Warsaw. Great growth is also expected in local realities characterised by seasonal peaks that disrupt ordinary logistics. More information is available at www.personalbus.it.