Afc System And Equipment

Afc System And Equipment

Automatic Fare Collection System And Equipment
An Automatic Fare Collection (AFC) system is the digital equivalent to manual fare collection, integrating several components that automate every stage from ticket or pass purchase through validation and collection. This technology enables transit agencies to collect data more effectively, improve service, create more efficient fares policies, increase security and provide customers with a superior customer experience.

As public transportation solutions increasingly demand cost-effective options, AFC systems have become an integral component of transit infrastructure. Technological innovations and government initiatives to promote their adoption are driving their popularity within the market and contributing to its rapid expansion.

AFC systems are designed to combat frauds and revenue leakages by ensuring only valid tickets are used on transit vehicles. Furthermore, these systems offer passenger convenience by accepting different forms of payment such as cash and credit cards; more advanced AFC systems even track passenger movements so as to prevent overcrowding or congestion on board.

AFC systems consist of various devices, including ticket vending machines, service desks, integrated readers and validators, mobile apps and back office systems. These devices serve to validate or read fare media such as smart cards and paper tickets as well as monitor and manage transaction flow between ticketing system and back office system. To ensure accurate transactions using sophisticated technologies such as radio frequency identification (RFID), near field communication (NFC), etc.

Communication panels are another crucial feature to look for in an AFC system. These allow back office communication through various mediums like Wi-Fi modem, LTE/3G/4G or even more recently 5G transmitter. Communication panels allow back offices to keep tabs on individual travel history; using this information for various services like daily fare caps and dynamic pricing to maximize capacity utilization.

Linking AFC systems with ITS technologies enables accessing insights into ridership trends that can help planners and schedulers understand ridership patterns more clearly, which can then be combined with comprehensive transportation management systems to determine stop-level profitability and efficiency metrics for transit agencies and Transportation Network Companies (TNCs).

AFC systems can make bus transit operations run more efficiently by offering more flexible fare options, increasing passenger convenience, and increasing turnover. They also enable agencies to implement rear-door boarding for faster loading times and reduced dwell time; increasing passenger access by offering tap and go lane and separate purchase/question line; this will decrease wait time onboard while improving passenger service while decreasing operating costs for agencies/TNCs alike.


Automatic Fare Gates (AG, AFC Gates)