Singapore LTA starts trial to better match taxi supply with demand

THE Land Transport Authority (LTA) is embarking on a one-year trial of a Taxi Information System (TIS) from Wednesday to better match taxi supply with demand.

Seven taxi stands located at HarbourFront Centre, Hitachi Towers, Keck Seng Tower, Lucky Plaza, Ngee Ann City, OG People's Park and VivoCity have been selected for the trial.

The TIS uses heat sensor technology to detect commuters waiting in the taxi queue in real-time. This is supported by intelligent camera technology that displays video footage for taxi drivers and commuters to view the queue status. "With the TIS, taxi drivers can reduce empty cruising while commuters can also look forward to shorter taxi waiting times,'' LTA said.

In the initial stage of the trial, the system is configured to alert the taxi companies' call centres automatically when there are 15 or more people in the queue, and when the average waiting time for a taxi is more than 15 minutes.

Real-time footage of the taxi passenger queue at these seven locations will be available online at MyTransport.SG (www.mytransport.sg) from Wednesday. It can also be accessed on the MyTransport.SG mobile phone application. The updated application will be available for Android users at Google Play from Wednesday, while the update for iPhone users will be available later.