Tyler Wells, ISV and Strategic Accounts Partner Manager, Americas, MicroTouch, and writing for Digital Signage Today, says that the next time you’re in a newly renovated airport, train station or other transportation hub, you’ll see new LED departures and arrivals boards updating in real time that travellers can see from any angle.

Wayfinding digital signage also directs people to the gates they need to catch their flights, trains or buses and the quickest route to baggage claim and vehicle rentals, helping them save valuable time.

Furthermore, these facilities make even more essential information available to enhance experiences. Travellers can review digital menus outside restaurants or find lists of top-selling books or promotions for items that make their trips more pleasant. Those same digital signs can also provide travellers with urgent messaging, like weather updates, delays, and even breaking news.

The transportation industry is also accommodating the increasing demand for self-service. Travellers can now manage tasks on their own, from boarding passes and baggage tickets to ordering at a café or checking out at a shop. Touchscreen self-service solutions allow them to skip the line, save time, and have greater control over their experiences.

Since 2020, every airport or transportation hub renovation has included digital solutions that give travellers easier access to information and self-service options. Several factors are driving technology implementation in transportation:

The Critical Need For Greater Efficiency

Transportation hubs have been hit hard by the labour shortage, with vacancies in customer-facing positions in airports, train and bus stations, multimodal centres, and restaurant and maintenance positions. Administrators must make the best use of available labour to keep operations running on schedule. Offering digital wayfinding, information access, and self-service ordering and checkout allows managers to allocate labour to critical tasks rather than continually fielding travellers’ questions and accomplish more with fewer employees.

Revenue-Driving Messaging

Selling advertising space in airports and other transportation hubs is a lucrative enterprise. Companies want to get their messaging in front of thousands of travellers who pass by the signage each day. Furthermore, it’s effective. Ads for the in-demand products at duty-free shops can influence purchases and build revenues for brands and the transportation hub.

Catching Up With Tech Adoption

Transportation hubs must modernise to enable integration with their partners and provide the experiences that consumers demand. While new tech implementation takes time, requiring approvals and budget allocations, it’s still vital for these organisations to move forward to enable efficient data sharing, automate processes, and increase customer satisfaction with their travel experiences.

Expect the transportation industry to continue to find ways to leverage technology to improve operations. Artificial intelligence (AI), which is already used for ID verification and security in many airports and transportation hubs, will play a bigger role in the future. For example, digital signage and wayfinding solutions provider 22Miles has developed an AI Assistant with Wayfinding, which allows travellers to ask the system for help in their language of choice, and multilingual digital signage systems provide them with the information they need.

Airports will also find new ways to use AI, for example, analysing foot traffic patterns to inform plans to minimise bottlenecks or to collect demographic data on people who stop to look at advertisements or products to increase value to advertisers.

The bottom line: now that digital transformation has begun, it will continue and, most likely, accelerate as the returns from greater efficiency, more revenue, and improved experiences will easily justify the investment. Digital signage and touchscreen solutions make travel more convenient and less stressful for consumers, as well as making travel more financially viable for transportation providers, a trend that will only continue to grow.

This article appears in Digital Signage Today.