2017 Y4PT Global Hackathon Fair

12-14 May 2017 | Montréal, Québec (Canada, North America)

62nd UITP Global Public Transport Summit Montreal 2017

The world’s first ever global transport hackathon in the framework of the world’s oldest and largest sustainable mobility event

Y4PT Hackathon Fair:

Meet all the Projects and the Young People behind them

Projects

After having taken place the Hackathon, the best projects were showcased during the Hackathon Fair at the UITP Summit, where UITP members, congress delegates and visitors had the opportunity to have a closer look at the projects and their authors.

1st Place: Team Ditch

“An education and gamification tool to motivate kids towards choosing sustainable transport.”

Team Ditch to developed an app to encourage children in the use of sustainable transport. The app shows different modes of transport for a selected route, offering various points and rewards depending on the chosen mode of transport.

Ditch are: Juan Sebastian Canavera Herrera (Designer from Cambridge, UK), Igor Georgioski (UX/UI Designer & Business Modeller from Ohrid, Macedonia), Thomas Hepner (Software Engineer from Santiago, Chile), Maria Kaimaki (Nanotech Researcher from Cambridge, UK), Thomas Michem (Information Architect from Ghent, Belgium), & Kim Smulders (Designer from Eindhoven, The Netherlands) .

Contact e-mail: jsc80@cam.ac.uk

1st Place: Team UpWay

“An augmented reality app to help people find their way in, out and around city transport hubs and underground networks.”

Targeting the confusion that people often face when using unknown metro systems, Team UpWay developed a navigation app incorporating 3D modelling and augmented reality technology. The app also includes a feature that allows users to discover surrounding restaurants and services, adding to UpWay’s goal of unlocking cities to visitors.

UpWay are: Jonathan Adiaheno (Mechanical Engineering/Developer from Montréal , Canada & Gabon), Aleksandrs Konopackis (Idea Generator from Manchester, England / Daugavpils, Latvia), Ignacio O’Mullony (Designer from Manchester, UK / Spain), Eloi Stree (Game & VR dev from Brussels, Belgium), and Charles-Henri Van Nuvel (Developer from Belgium).

Contact e-mail: streeeloi@gmail.com

2nd Place: Team Air4

“Providing an affordable solution to measure, see and avoid smog.”

Air4 created a mobile measuring station for air pollution, and an app that uses data from the device to calculate travel routes with the lowest pollution rate. The device and app provide an affordable solution to combating air pollution, a critical issue that claims millions of lives each year.

Air4 are: André Borges (Renewable Energy Engineer from Lisbon, Portugal), Seydou Konate (Software Developer from Bamko,Mali) Julius Mugaga (Biomedical Engineer from Kampala, Uganda), Marco van Nieuwenhoven (Software/Electrical Engineer from Eindhoven, the Netherlands), & Massimo Santi (Mechanical Engineer from Brescia, Italy).

Contact e-mail: marco@vannieuwenhoven.com

3rd Place: Team uDeliver

“A city logistics crowdsourcing solution connecting commuters to parcel delivery.”

With the aim of reducing the number of delivery vehicles on the road, uDeliver developed a solution that allows users to make deliveries on behalf of companies. The app connects users to deliveries based on their existing commutes, resulting in a more sustainable and efficient delivery system.

uDeliver are: Filip Ivic (Software Developer from Zagreb, Croatia), Tomas Janovsky (Marketing / Business Development from the Czech Republic), Jan Kouba (Software Developer from the Czech Republic), Tomas Kouba (Biz / UX / Marketing from the Czech Republic), Matej Kuraja (Software Developer from Zagreb, Croatia), Dejan Pavkovic (Software Developer from Zagreb, Croatia), and Uli Stroetz (Software Developer from Berlin, Germany).

Contact e-mail: t.kouba@gmail.com

FINALISTS

Team RoadTripper

“Data analysis for better roads”

Roadtripper gathers and analyses pothole and road damage data, to facilitate more efficient road maintenance and safer journeys.

Roadtripper are: Pablo Arias (Telecommunication Engineer from Madrid, Spain), Gerardo Riano (Control Engineer from Bogotá, Colombia), Gustavo Sales (Web Developer from Sao Paulo, Brasil), Matheus Sales (Web Developer from Sao Paulo, Brasil), Max Schedin (Software Developer from Stockholm, Sweden) and Fidel Tamayo (Business Development from Quito, Ecuador).

Contact e-mail: ga.riano949@uniandes.edu.co

Team FindMyTaxi

“A platform that decreases the waiting times for shared taxis in developing countries.”

Based on personal experience as a commuter in South Africa, FindMyTaxi developed a chatbot solution for shared taxi reservation in developing countries. Building on existing infrastructure and local communication preferences, the team created a quick-to-implement, scalable platform.

FindMyTaxi are: Myriam Beauvais (Developer from Montréal, Canada), Sebastien Blais-Fernandez (Developer from Montréal, Canada), Abhishek Gupta (Developer from Montréal, Canada). Poyan Nabati (Developer from Stockholm, Sweden), Emma Phiri (Idea Generator from Cape Town, South Africa) and Keven Villeneuve (Developer from Montréal, Canada).

Contact e-mail: emmaphiri@hotmail.com

Team VirtualBusStop

“Putting your bus stop in your hands – a digital platform connecting people, local businesses and authorities around bus stops.”

Inspired by the conflict between vandalism and community messaging on bus stops, Virtual Bus Stop seeks to make the real world more beautiful by providing a hyperlocal virtual space bus stop users can use to share messages, information and decoration.

Virtual Bus Stop are: Beibut Amirgaliyev (Product Manager from Almaty, Kazakhstan), Catalina Espinoza (Programmer from Santiago, Chile), Diego Espinoza (Transport Engineer from Santiago, Chile), Alejandro Lavado (Strategist from Santiago, Chile), Carolina Soto (Designer from Santiago, Chile), Bruno Stefoni (Transport Engineer from Santiago, Chile), and Bisher Zumot (Designer & Developer from Dubai. UAE).

Contact e-mail: brunostefoni12@gmail.com

OTHER PROJECTS

Team WalkWalk

App to encourage healthy mobility.

UK-Spain – Manchester representatives – Ignacio O’mullony

Contact e-mail: ignaciomullony@gmail.com

Background

With increasing digitalization, globalization and new players entering the sector, in times of rapid change, we must play with the new constraints and we cannot afford to stand on the sidelines. We must play an active role and “LEAD the TRANSITion”!

The Youth For Public Transport (Y4PT) Foundation (https://www.y4pt.org/), with the support of the International Association of Public Transport (UITP) (https://www.uitp.org/), its members and other stakeholders, and following a long-standing tradition of Y4PT Youth Lab series, is promoting the organization of local transport hackathons around the world, by combining the best of boundless human creativity and the benefits of current information and communications technologies (ICTs) in collaborative environments, with the aim of advancing transport sector towards sustainability.

Winners from each local transport hackathon and several international enthusiasts will join other Canada-based hackers at the 1st Y4PT Global Transport Hackathon Montreal 2017 (https://www.y4pt.org/projects/youth-meeting/montreal-2017/) in the framework of the 62nd UITP Global Public Transport Summit Montreal 2017 (https://www.uitpsummit.org/) – the world’s oldest and largest sustainable transport event – to contest in a final round for unveiling the world’s best ground-breaking transport solutions.

20 cities around the world hosted the first local transport hackathons during the 2016-2017 season: Almaty (Kazakhstan), Bogotá (Colombia), Brescia (Italy), Brussels (Belgium), Cambridge (England), Cape Town (South Africa), Dubai (United Arab Emirates), Eindhoven (Netherlands), Ghent (Belgium), Kampala (Uganda), Lisbon (Portugal), Madrid (Spain), Manchester (England), Medellín (Colombia), Prague (Czech Republic), Santiago de Chile (Chile), Skopje (Macedonia-FYROM), São Paulo (Brazil), Stockholm (Sweden), Zagreb (Croatia) among others.

Different stakeholders such as universities, youth groups, ICT companies, transport operators, authorities, start-up mentors, innovation centers and hackers are called to collaborate with Y4PT and to be part of the world’s first ever global transport hackathon.

Everyone is invited to get on board. This is a one-off opportunity to show to your audience and users how important is for you to support this kind of event where innovation and creativity is putting forward new ICT-related solutions to boost both the private sector business performance and the public sector policy efficacy, and thus to unlock new opportunities to expand, diversify and renew your organization’s portfolio of products and services.

What is a Hackathon?

A Hackathon is an event, typically lasting several days, where a number of skilled people meet to engage in software programming and hardware prototyping, with the aim of ingeniously solving specific issues in a collaborative and cooperative environment. Hackathon outcomes usually lead to the inception of startup projects and trigger other innovation processes in different ICT-intensive fields such as the transport sector.

Overview

Most of the cities are going through a gradually-increasing integration with the outer world that has meant new and disruptive socio-economic conditions which market and its players are yet striving to adapt well. For instance immigration, climate change and security are three core pending issues on both the local and global agendas.

Furthermore, emerging concepts such as sharing economy are not anymore a matter of the future. They are already here, being present now among all of us somehow. And they are fostering a fast change at all levels in different sectors, forcing all existing approaches to be re-thought.

For years the transport field has served as the right testing ground for new technological developments and results have been later replicated in other sectors.

In the light of the above, several stakeholders, with the Roads and Transport Authority of the Emirate of Dubai (RTA Dubai) (https://www.rta.ae/) and Ferrovie Nord Milano (FNM) S.p.A. (https://www.fnmgroup.it/) as the Honorary Founding Members of the Y4PT Foundation, have joined forces along with UITP, to organize the world’s first ever transport hackathon, an open and collaborative space where people are called to contribute to solving major transport-related challenges while employing ICTs in an ingenious way.

Transport Challenges

Hackathon projects should contribute somehow to a ultimate goal, doubling public transport’s market share worldwide (PTx2): UITP estimates that it would save around 170m tons of oil and 550m tons of CO2 equivalent; reduce urban traffic fatalities by 15%; double the number of jobs in public transport operators as well as reduce the risk of obesity and heart disease by 50% thanks to the greater role of walking, cycling and public transport.

Moreover all projects should be in line with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially the one addressing sustainable transport (Target 11.2): “By 2030, provide access to safe, affordable, accessible and sustainable transport systems for all, improving road safety, notably by expanding public transport, with special attention to the needs of those in vulnerable situations, women, children, persons with disabilities and older persons”.

A wide range of current and critical challenges faced by the transport sector as a whole will be addressed during the Hackathon, with public transport as the cornerstone of multimodal mobility solutions, in line with the Y4PT’s holistic point of view on sustainable transport.

Congestion
Urban Sprawl
Shared mobility
Road Safety
Active Travel
Urban Pollution (Air-related and others)
Security
Accessibility for Persons with Reduced Mobility
Combination of Passenger and Freight Transport
Intermodalilty
Health and Transport
Long-Haul Transport
Payment and Pricing
Weather Forecast and Climate Change
Electrification of Transport (Zero Emissions)

Organizers

The Hackathon has brought together the most important actors in the transport sector worldwide:

Roads and Transport Authority of the Emirate of Dubai (RTA Dubai) (https://www.rta.ae/): One of the most acknowledged and respected transport authorities in the world, RTA Dubai is the local government entity that regulates urban mobility in the whole Emirate.
Ferrovie Nord Milano (FNM Milan) S.p.A. (https://www.fnmgroup.it/): The second largest rail transport operator in the country, FNM Milan provides mobility services in the northern region of Italy.
International Association of Public Transport (UITP) (https://www.uitp.org/): With over 130 years of history, UITP is the only spokesperson for the public transport sector worldwide, representing the interests of all stakeholders, including authorities, operators, supply industry, and academic-research centers.
Youth For Public Transport (Y4PT) Foundation (https://www.y4pt.org/): Established more than 10 years ago by the UITP, Y4PT is the leading global youth network on sustainable transport.