Jerry Buttimer (Cork South-Central, Fine Gael)

I thank Deputy O'Connell for taking this question. I thank her for the question. Like her, I am eager to see best practice being implemented across our public transport sector, including passenger technology. As we heard from Deputy O’Connell and from Deputy Currie earlier, it is a very important matter. Public transport apps are not simply about having a technological solution for the sake of it. Rather, they are about having information available to people so that they can make the best use of our public transport system, especially those who may be new to it or have difficulty finding the best way of making their journey. It is also about having the confidence and that piece around reliability.

The NTA is responsible for several mobile applications, including the TFI Leap Top-Up; the TFI Go mobile ticketing app; TFI Anseo demand-responsive application; and the TFI Live mobile application, which are used for journey planning and for the provision of real-time information to customers.

In all cases, the NTA works extensively with the supplier to deliver the best possible result.

The NTA has collaborated with other public transport authorities on an app design. As an example, the NTA has worked closely with Transport for Scotland on a redesign of TFI Live. Unfortunately, progress has been slower than anticipated because of a lack of mobile application development capacity with the source supplier. While the TFI Live application does function and does present journey planning and real-time data to customers, the NTA is currently investigating options to expedite improvements to the application to improve the customer experience.

One project that will produce improved quality journey data to the TFI Live app is next generation automatic vehicle location, AVL, which replaces five old automatic vehicle location systems with a new centralised solution, to provide higher quality and consistent data outputs to the TFI Live mobile app. This project is going to pilot in March 2026, with the full roll-out taking approximately 12-18 months, which I look forward to seeing happening. I will conclude by saying that people often express their frustration to me about the performance of the app. It is something we need to improve on and work with Members of the House to see this delivered.

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