We have developed a full Watertaxi Operations System (WOS) for Watertaxi Rotterdam. As WTR is growing from 600.000 towards 1 million customers per year, digitalization and automation in planning and fleet management are a must. Therefore, WOS features booking options, rides planning, integrated payment systems, a business portal, CRM and fleet tracking.

In the past years, our software engineers have built a complete package. The WOS project so far includes:

• The development of the Watertaxi Rotterdam app for customers. We developed the front-end and back-end. The app allows ordering trips between any of the 50+ jetties in the city. The user receives real-time booking suggestions based on the network state. The app features trip request options, user accounts and mobile payment methods.
• Full stack development of hardware and software of the Databox. The databox collects position and motion data. This data is used in the planning software to compare the fleet state with the planned state. Furthermore, health data of the boat systems can be used to make maintenance procedures more effective.
• Design and development of interactive business reporting software trip and revenue statistics. This allows comparison of revenues between routes, periods and boats.
• Integration of new payment terminals with on-board data system, leading to a rapid increase in payment speed on-board.
• Development and implementation of an algorithm for automatic fleet planning. On busy days, thousands of people request custom trips. As the taxi-boat can serve 12 passengers maximum, trips around the city can be combined in smart ways to maximize fleet capacity and minimize fuel consumption and emissions. The algorithm allows the planners to shift focus to customer service and requests.

WOS supports three types of water-based services: on-demand taxi rides, on-demand cruises and scheduled ferry services. In Rotterdam, these three services are carried out by a single fleet.We have designed the WOS software in such a way that we can expand to other water-rich cities. This allows many more cities to benefit from water taxi services.