No matter how interconnected our world becomes, there will always be a need for people to get from point A to point B. In the past, this need was facilitated by a combination of public and private transportation, both of which are inherently expensive and wasteful. Public transit ridership has increased by 26% during the last 20 years, and in 2016, Americans took 10.2 billion trips on some form of public transportation. The need for a robust public transportation system is only bound to increase, which is why experts are keen to explore opportunities for the betterment of public transit, which would ultimately provide them convenience.
One such opportunity introduced by Haris N. Koutsopoulos, a professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Northeastern University, is predicting the short term future. Whenever we hear the word ‘prediction,’ a sense of excitement invades the mind. We all were amazed to see the character of Doctor Strange by the Marvel entertainment house. Not because of his performance on the battlefield but, owing to his ability to see the future. Have you wondered how our lives will dramatically change if we could foresee the route we’ll take in an hour and leave accordingly? And foreseeing the immediate future isn’t just a dream now owing to the real-time predictive analysis model by the professor.
He elucidated, “Such models are based upon analyses of large swaths of automated fare-collection data that can reveal past travel patterns as well as real-time factors such as weather, events, and eventually, even social media chatter.” The moment this model gets approved and applied in real-time, there won’t be any astonishment in seeing absolutely no cars on the routes where the traffic jams were quite anticipated. It’s about being proactive, not reactive. This model, without any doubt, won’t be less than one of the most significant discoveries in the past two decades.
Harminder Singh