The Routing Company (“TRC”), a global on-demand vehicle routing and management platform partnering with cities to power the future of public transit, today introduced Pingo Journey™, its latest in-app innovation. Pingo Journey™ is a new feature within TRC’s leading product, the Ride Pingo™ app (“Pingo”), that lets passengers hail on-demand transit rides and plan their transit journeys in one place. The feature is immediately available for procurement by transit agencies worldwide, and is anticipated to first launch in North America this fall.
With the introduction of Pingo Journey™, Pingo becomes the world’s only app allowing riders to hail on-demand transit services and plan their entire journey to a final destination by using all existing transit modes in real-time. Effectively, Pingo Journey™ lets riders plan multimodal journeys, request on-demand rides, buy on-demand transit tickets, and link to all other transit modes in the network.
“Riders told us they loved the Pingo app. Agencies told us they needed a single app to deliver journey planning and connect on-demand rides to fixed route networks,” said James Cox, Chief Executive Officer, TRC. “Over the past year we did just that, integrating TRC’s unrivaled real-time routing technology with public transit infrastructure to build the most comprehensive journey planner for public transit riders.”
Pingo Journey™ is powered by integration of on-demand transit services with all existing transit modes. This makes Pingo Journey™ a direct complement to TRC’s existing app feature, Transit Connect, which guarantees connections for riders to existing fixed route networks. No other app on the market offers a connection guarantee, and effective today, Pingo Journey™ is available for procurement by transit agencies around the world.
“We combined the convenience of demand-responsive transit with the efficiency of fixed transit, and the resulting product makes Pingo the first-of-its-kind tool for transit riders. People have tried to improve multimodal transit journeys for decades, but this is the first time you can improve commute times by orchestrating on-demand rides, dispatching better connections, and controlling journey planning in one place,” said Cox.
Pingo Journey™ can operate in on-demand, paratransit, fixed-route, and flex transit mode. When used by transit agencies, it allows riders to see all public transit options in the area – including hailing on-demand rides, connecting to fixed transit routes, requesting paratransit rides, or planning a trip using fixed (or deviated fixed) lines. It is a breakthrough in route planning and access to multi-modal mobility.
Transit agencies operating the app for drivers (Drive Pingo™) and riders (Ride Pingo™) also have immediate access to TRC’s Pingo Dashboard™ – allowing management of daily operations, call center functions, advance trip booking, and real-time performance metrics. Drive Pingo, Ride Pingo, and Pingo Dashboard are powered by the same engine: TRC’s unrivaled MIT-inspired algorithm.
Aimed at providing the best journey planning app in the market, TRC continues to invest in product improvement and anticipates offering omni-modal journey planning through Pingo Journey™ in 2023.