NFC TIMES Exclusive Insight – With public transit ridership decreasing in most large U.S. cities over the past five years, transit authorities are more open to becoming part of Mobility-as-a-Service platforms, which could potentially increase ridership for their rail and bus networks while offering customers options for the first and last mile.
But while trip-planning apps are providing riders with ever more detailed information on transportation options, schedules, routes and service alerts, one piece that has been largely missing from these platforms is payments. For many observers, true Mobility-as-a-Service, or MaaS, apps must provide users with a way to pay for their trips, if possible, from door to destination.
This is one of the motivations behind the deal announced last week by Israel-based trip-planning and mobility information provider Moovit and U.S.-based Cubic Transportation Systems, the largest provider of fare collection systems globally.
