Vehicle routing and scheduling has moved into a new era, in which schedules can be uploaded from office to truck cab in real time; drivers can be guided automatically to the next call location; proof of delivery information can be passed back to base; and delivery progress and vehicle positions can be monitored back at the office.
Yet operators don’t need all these refinements in order to benefit from the core attractions of a successful routing and scheduling system – notably the ability to do more work with a given vehicle fleet, or to enhance service levels on existing operations.
These are among the keynote themes on the stand of MapMechanics (hall 4, stand 4250) at this year’s CV Show, which runs at the National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham from 25 to 27 April.
MapMechanics Mobile, the company’s mobility solutions suite, has matured significantly since its announcement last year, and early implementations are now going live. The system delivers routing and scheduling information wirelessly in real time to drivers out on the road, guiding them to their destinations and reporting their progress back to base. It can work with most mainstream routing and scheduling solutions, including TruckStops, the system supplied and supported by MapMechanics, and is compatible with leading navigation systems such as TomTom.
Typically, schedules produced by software such as TruckStops are passed automatically to a PDA (personal digital assistant) carried by the driver, showing correct job details for each call in sequence, and automatically displaying navigation instructions to the next call point. Calls can even be amended back at base in real time, and revised schedules fed to the driver “on the fly”.
Managing director Mary Short comments: “Not only is MapMechanics Mobile proving attractive in operations where routes vary from day to day, and drivers don’t necessarily know the destinations; it’s also showing potential for cutting driver training costs. Operators are telling us they can avoid the need to send out experienced drivers with new recruits, since the system can help guide them to unfamiliar destinations.”
The CV Show also marks the first public showing of several new data products and software features from MapMechanics, including a dataset of 5,100 bridge heights in Great Britain. This can be integrated with digital map data such as the NAVTEQ range, giving transport operators an ideal opportunity to take account of bridge heights (which are continually checked), and new information is provided with each update. The product contains both metric and imperial signed heights, along with the road number, the relevant highways authority and bridge owner, and the obstruction type (for instance, railway bridge or wires) and bridge type (for instance beam, girder or arch).
The progressive refinement of MapMechanics Mobile represents an evolutionary step for the company, which is a long-time specialist in routing, scheduling, digital mapping and other products related to planning and monitoring movement and location.
“While established products such as TruckStops remain at the heart of our portfolio, we’ve recognised that many vehicle operators want an integrated approach,” Mary Short says. “If, for example, they want to track vehicles on the Internet by GPS at the same time as managing scheduling and service delivery, we can now supply or assemble systems that meet their requirements.”
The CV Show also serves as a reminder that many MapMechanics products, including GeoConcept, the powerful mapping and geographic information system, are already used by other leading players in the transport management market. At the CV Show there are a number of exhibitors with products and services which are using software and map data solutions from MapMechanics, including vehicle tracking specialists Seven Eye and Tracker Network.
“Because our core expertise extends outwards into so many areas of the transport market, we can pull together components for operators who are building their own mobile management systems, but who need support with the more specialised elements,” Mary Short says. “We’re in a perfect position to ‘fill in the gaps’ in their expertise, drawing on our extensive experience of the transport world, and our expertise in both fixed and mobile technologies.”
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