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It’s been a year of significant development within the UK bus industry, with the transition to public control in major cities and franchising plans becoming clearer. In addition to this the recently announced fare cap increase to £3 from 1st January 2025 will balance affordability for passengers with the financial stability of bus services over the coming year.
There’s an optimistic outlook on what's ahead, as captured in our 2024 State of UK Public Transport survey, with increasing patronage identified as the biggest opportunity for the sector and the need for more data tools surfacing as the biggest challenge. At CitySwift we believe that the true measure of success of the latest transport technologies lies in the hands of the people who know the industry best.
As we close out 2024, we’re reflecting on an incredible year of growth and innovation. Here’s our round-up of highlights from across the year, as well as a sneak peek at what’s ahead for CitySwift in 2025.
Scaling our company
We kicked off the year with our latest round of funding to extend our data solutions for operators and authorities. This funding is being used to scale platform development, enhance client services, and accelerate our growth. We opened our first UK office, marking a new chapter in expanding our presence across the UK.
CitySwift’s innovation partnership with National Express West Midlands launched our biggest feature release to date - Spotlight. This intelligent, personalised recommendation engine highlights what changes will make the biggest impact for your network. This release propelled our platform to new heights in performance optimisation and predictive analytics.
Delivering results on-the-road
CitySwift’s runtime recommendations have consistently delivered strong network improvements for National Express West Midlands (NXWM) over the last four years, including a significant 17% increase in punctuality for routes optimised in January 2024. It has also led to an improved passenger experience, with a 5% increase in patronage, an 18% reduction in late running, and a 1% reduction in overall resources required. NXWM’s roll-out of our platform across the entire fleet will enable these strong on-the road results to be extended to the rest of the operator’s network.
Blackpool Transport kicked off 2024 with the biggest schedule change undertaken in 5 years, generating cost savings of £200k by saving a bus. CitySwift provides Blackpool Transport with reliable, accurate data that enables them to speed up network performance analysis, deliver new insights, and optimise runtimes to improve service punctuality and reliability for passengers.
Since implementing CitySwift on two trial corridors in 2023, Reading Buses achieved improvements of 9.1% and 14.2% in punctuality on these routes. The strong results of this pilot, which also saw growth in passenger usage, led to the rollout of CitySwift’s platform to its entire commercial network.
Expanding new partnerships
This year, we announced new partnerships with operators and authorities in the UK, including Go-Ahead Group and Transport for Greater Manchester, enabling them to harness the power of data to build smarter, more efficient transport networks.
From improving punctuality to enhancing passenger satisfaction, we’re helping operators and authorities to make public transport more reliable and accessible. And with all of this year's new partnership announcements CitySwift’s platform is now optimising over 1.3 billion passenger journeys annually.
Preparing for franchising
Initially starting with 5 of the major Welsh operators as part of a pilot, Transport for Wales expanded the number of operators on the CitySwift platform to 40 to prepare for franchising. Through making data-informed decisions in the best interests of passengers TfW is identifying the best possible improvements that can be made to the network to benefit the local population.
Our latest report, The Role of Performance Data in Delivering the Optimal Franchised Transport Network, deep dives into how data-driven decision making is revolutionising franchised network planning, tendering, and in-life management. We’re proud to be at the forefront of this shift harnessing the power of performance data to plan the transport networks of the future.
Celebrating the best in bus
Rounding out the year, we were honored to sponsor the Environmental Innovation category at the 2024 UK Bus Awards. The shortlisted entries in this category showcased the incredible work being done to reduce the environmental impact of the UK bus industry, and we were thrilled to celebrate the pioneers leading the way in sustainable transport.
What’s ahead for CitySwift in 2025?
Taking innovation to the next level
We’re looking forward to launching the new features we have planned that will empower transport operators and authorities with even greater data insights and tools. Our commitment to pushing the boundaries of data-driven transport performance optimisation solutions will continue into next year and beyond.
Driving sustainability
Sustainability is at the heart of everything we do at CitySwift. In 2025, we’re further supporting the transition to cleaner, greener transport networks that benefit both cities and the environment, including showcasing the impact CitySwift’s platform is having on reducing carbon emissions.
Continuing to collaborate
We’re looking forward to strengthening our existing partnerships, and forging new ones in new regions, as we continue on our mission to empower public transport operators and authorities to create growing, high-performing and sustainable public transport networks.
Thank you for a fantastic 2024
None of the success we’ve achieved this year would be possible without the dedication of our amazing team, the trust of our customers, and the support of our partners. To all of you—thank you for being part of our journey.
Here’s to an even bigger and brighter 2025!
