TORONTO – Ottawa Nav, a free traffic management app released Monday, is not your average traffic app.
Created by the City of Ottawa and Flybits, an emerging startup out of Ryerson University, the app connects users to the city’s infrastructure information to deliver real-time traffic and route information.
According to Dr. Hossein Rahnama, Founder and CEO of Flybits, the app maps the city into different zones, using up-to-the-minute data from the City of Ottawa.
As the user navigates the city, they receive traffic information relevant to their route – in real time – to navigate through areas of construction, road closures, and even unexpected disruptions like accidents.
The app also has different functions depending on who is using it.
For example, a passenger using the app can display maps and up to 200 traffic camera views throughout the city. For drivers, Ottawa Nav provides audio guidance for construction.
Ottawa Nav currently covers about 20 to 25 zones across the Ottawa area – including most of the suburbs – using key areas that the city currently covers.
“Most of the city is covered,” said Rahnama.
Rahnama told Global News Monday that there will be many updates to the app in the future, including incorporating route-planning tools and re-routing tools that can get users around an area of bad traffic. The company also hopes to include a feature that switches the app to ‘drivers mode’ when the user starts driving, in order to combat distracted driving.
He noted that the city is trying to partner with other services like Bixi bike and OC Transpo, the local Ottawa transportation company, to include live updates for these services using information from their independent apps.
“It’s more like an eco system – all of the other app developers and solution builders can provide their services to this platform and then depending on where the user is in the city they will be able to fetch those applications,” Rahnama said.
“It’s not just Flybits services; all the other digital services can be delivered through this app.”
The benefit to the city is that all information is controlled through an easy-to-use web portal, meaning that there is no extra integration when information needs to be changed.
Ottawa Nav was created as part of a ‘smart city enabler solution,’ the foundation of the Flybits platform, according to Rahnama.
“We have customized our platform for the city of Ottawa so now they can use our platform to provide relevant data to the citizens of Ottawa using an application,” he said.
Flybits’ platform has been used for other applications, including the GO transit mobile app, but this is the first time the startup has utilized the platform for city-wide use.
“Instead of the municipality relying on an app that requires a lot of updates as soon as there is a change, they can use our platform to update it over the air and be more engaged with the commuters and citizens in Ottawa,” Rahnama said.
Rahnama said Ottawa is the first in the world to release an app that uses this context-aware system, which means the system uses contextual parameters – such as location, day, time, and personal preferences – to customize the user experience.
Unlike generic mapping and transit applications, which hundreds of cities across North America use to help navigate commuters, Ottawa Nav separates itself by allowing multiple apps and platforms to feed in information.
“How do you just create one ecosystem that can speak the same language? Where the airport can talk to the road authorities, who talk to transit, and all of them provide a unique and unified experience for the user – I think that’s where context awareness comes into play,” said Rahnama.
Rahnama said the end goal is to implement apps like this across the country.
Ottawa Nav is available for free on iOS through Apple’s App Store and the Google Play Store for Android devices.
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