Integration and automation: key issues in public transport fleets maintenance

Breakdowns and malfunctions in public transport vehicles have serious impacts in terms of road safety, traffic conditions, financial profitability and environmental damage. Due to these reasons, fleet maintenance is a big share of public transport companies´ budget. DIAMANTE (ESPRIT-PASO Programme), a 24 months R+D project started in January 1994, aims to develop an integral maintenance system for public transport fleets. The DIAMANTE project implements a pilot system for the automation of malfunction detection in public transport vehicles, even before they degenerate into breakdowns. The process of management of these anomalies is integrated in the information network of the public transport company. This is a first step to develop a final product that can cover this void in the information infrastructure of public transport companies. Larger scale demonstrations and activities related to standardisation are planned in the near future in the framework of the Transport Telematics Programme of the European Commission (DGXIII)