The DELFI system, that aims to provide doorto-
door travel information for public transport
users in whole Germany, was launched in
1996 by the German Ministry of transport in
co-operation with the Länder (regions).
A first
version of the system was officially presented
on 28th June. Instead of being a new countrywide
journey planner, DELFI connects the
existing journey planners of Länder and of DB
with each other.
DELFI, which is available on
the internet sites of the project partners, was
developed by the company Inovaplan and
relies on exchange of data.
It is hoped that DELFI will facilitate the
planning of trips of public transport users, and
even attract new passengers.
Integrated
information between local, regional and
national transport networks is indeed a key
factor to increase the attractiveness of public
transport systems.
It can be noticed that the European project
EU-Spirit aims to develop at the European level
a similar travel information system offering the
calculation of door to door travel itineraries
between European cities or regional areas.
This
system includes all public transport modes
from taxi to airplane. Up to now, operators of
travel planners from Denmark, Germany and
Sweden participate in the project, but all
operators of internet based travel planners are
invited to join the system and thereby offer
additional services to their customers.