TWO ABERYSTWYTH students have won a national competition for their app which helps improve access to train stations.
Hosted by the Rail Data Marketplace (RDM) and Rail Industry Association (RIA), the competition invited entrants to propose ideas to tackle two important industry challenges: predicting how long it will take to resolve a rail disruption or making rail travel easier for passengers with accessibility needs.
Jonathan Turnbull and Oscar Tikadar, final year students in the Department of Computer Science, competed against individuals, university teams and commercial organisations to win the accessibility challenge with their concept for an app that makes rail travel easier for passengers with accessibility needs.
LogMyStation allows users to log UK train stations that they have visited and easily locate important station information, such as accessibility details, facilities, and live departures. The app includes text to speech functionality and uses symbols as well as words.
The Aberystwyth team was shortlisted to pitch their concept to the judges in a 15-minute ‘Dragons’ Den’-style presentation, held at the Railway Industry Association Innovation Conference in Newport last month.
The pair impressed the judging panel of industry leaders from the likes of Network Rail, Great British Railways, and the Department for Transport.
Oscar Tikadar, a third-year student in Computer Science & Physical Geography, said: “As well as being a valuable resource to help passengers to more easily navigate the UK’s railways, one of the more novel aspects of LogMyStation is the gameability factor.
“Users can ‘collect’ stations by recording their visit in the app and are then able to view the stations they have visited on a map, along with any comments they record.”
The winning team will now be allocated a leading industry mentor to work with them to develop their solution further.
Jonathan Turnbull, who is in the final year of a Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence degree, said: “We are thrilled to have won the competition, which was a great opportunity to showcase our idea to industry experts.
“We are very grateful to the judges and can’t wait to further develop our idea.”
Dr Thomas Jansen, Head of the Department of Computer Science at Aberystwyth University, said: “Myself and colleagues in the Department of Computer Science congratulate Jonathan and Oscar for their success in this national competition, and for using the skills and knowledge they have developed to strive to make a difference to the lives of others in society.
“We will be following with interest as they further develop their award-winning idea.”
