Intelligent Public Transportation Systems: A review of architectures and enabling technologies

Intelligent Public Transportation Systems (IPTS) are a subsystem of Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), which aim to control public transportation networks, to maintain their performance, and to provide users (passengers and decision makers) with up-to-date information about trips and network operating conditions. To reach these aims, IPTS rely on several technologies that can be embedded within different control architectures. This paper introduces IPTS components and technologies, identifies the different types of data captured from the transportation network and exchanged between IPTS components, and shows ways to integrate technological components and data within IPTS architectures. A section is dedicated to review architectural design of some developed IPTS to control public transportation networks. Finally, some challenges are discussed and further research directions are highlighted.