ATRON equips Upplands Lokaltrafik

As transport association and authority, Upplands Lokaltrafik (UL) is responsible for the complete public transport in the province of Uppsala Län. Around 29.5 million passengers are annually transported in trains and buses in the region, which is around 8,400 km² in size with ca. 345,000 inhabitants and borders Greater Stockholm.

Since September 2013, UL has been using the ATRON DEBAS ticketing system for its complete ticket sale and the processes involved regarding inspection, accounting and organisation. With this, UL connects the sales channels for urban and regional traffic, which have been separated before. In electronic ticketing, which is used by more than two thirds of the passengers in Swedish public transport, a smart card replaces many previous card types which were separated according to application areas. The current system by ATRON with the new smart cards also offers all options for interoperability to neighbouring associations, such as Stockholms Lokaltrafik.

In the meantime, ATRON has equipped all of UL’s 435 buses with smart card terminals of the type ACE 130 and on-board computers of the AFR4.2 series. Another 80 AFR4.2 were installed in customer centers and private sales centers. Furthermore, 25 ticket vending machines of the new AFA 470 series were set up at train stations. With the connection to the ATRON Internet sales system WebTick, passengers can alternatively buy tickets online now as well. 90 handhelds from the AMR series make mobile inspection of the electronic ticket as well as on-board sale possible. For a reliable data management, all sales channels are completely integrated into the high-performance central system ATRIES. After extensive preparation, the complete system conversion at UL was completed in the beginning of September 2013 within less than two weeks.

“That was a respectable achievement”, says Mikael Fritzing, Overall Project Manager of BIMS after the system acceptance. ATRON’s Senior Project Manager Sascha Stärk agrees with this and is already looking forward to the other system conversions which will follow soon.

Further installations by ATRON in Sweden

Within a major order of the Swedish consortium BIMS (Biljettsystem i Mellansverige), ATRON will completely re-equip other Swedish transport companies in the following months. After completing the project in the first half of 2014, a total of eight transport associations will be on the road in Central Sweden with modern ATRON devices. By means of this major project, ATRON will further expand its presence in Northern Europe.