What We Learned at the 2025 Transit Bus Summit

00:00 Stop Requested.

00:01 Levi McCollum: Welcome to Stop Requested, the podcast where we discuss everything transit.

00:05 Levi McCollum: I’m your co host, Levi McCollum, director of operations at ETA Transit.

00:10 Christian Londono: And I’m your co host, Christian Londono, Senior Customer Success Manager at ETA Transit.

00:20 Levi McCollum: Hey Christian, how are you today?

00:22 Christian Londono: Hey, Levi. Doing good. How’s it going?

00:26 Levi McCollum: That’s going pretty well. I’m really excited to hear what happened at the Transit Bus Summit.

00:31 Levi McCollum: I know you went there a couple weeks ago and spent a few days up in Jacksonville, so tell me

00:36 Levi McCollum: all about it.

00:38 Christian Londono: Yes, it was a great event.

00:41 Christian Londono: Honestly, I’ve been to a lot of transit conferences.

00:47 Christian Londono: The majority when I work for a transit agency.

00:50 Christian Londono: So kind of like in the agency side, not on the vendor side, but you know, going to the Transit

00:57 Christian Londono: Bus Summit, it’s quite different but very positive for both ends.

01:03 Christian Londono: Regardless if you are in the, you know, vendor side or if you’re in the agency side.

01:10 Christian Londono: It’s, it’s, it was a great experience.

01:13 Christian Londono: It’s very insightful. And you know, I’ll tell you, the Transit Bus Summit is an opportunity for transit executives.

01:22 Christian Londono: They typically bring, you know, leaders within a transit agency, those folks that are pretty much either leading a large

01:30 Christian Londono: department of the agency or leading the agency themselves itself, and also the vendors, representatives from the vendor community to

01:40 Christian Londono: bring people to together to learn from one another.

01:43 Christian Londono: So it was a great event.

01:45 Christian Londono: I think that highly recommended. No matter if you’re, you know, professional in a transit agency or if you’re a

01:52 Christian Londono: vendor that has not participated and might be interested in participating.

01:57 Christian Londono: Very great event.

01:59 Levi McCollum: Yeah, I would second that. I went last year and I can say that it is a different type of

02:04 Levi McCollum: conference.

02:04 Unknown: Right.

02:05 Levi McCollum: It’s not the traditional type where you might have, you know, one workshop or a couple workshops, and then most

02:13 Levi McCollum: of it is just one person talking at an audience.

02:17 Levi McCollum: This is very interactive, very participative.

02:21 Levi McCollum: And I think that that in and of itself kind of makes it stand out as a transit conference.

02:28 Levi McCollum: So I’m curious how this differs from when I went last year.

02:32 Levi McCollum: If you would just kind of break it down for me.

02:34 Levi McCollum: Let’s start with day one. What was that first day like? And what do you think were some of the

02:38 Levi McCollum: highlights?

02:40 Christian Londono: Yes, day one, you know, pretty much is check in, everybody coming in.

02:46 Christian Londono: Um, and. And you know, everybody goes through an orientation and you know, something that I like during about the

02:54 Christian Londono: orientation and they’re pretty much telling everyone is, is to really to be engaging.

03:00 Christian Londono: The. The what makes this a successful event is the engagement.

03:05 Christian Londono: Every person that is attending has kind of like Their personal agenda based on what they want to get out

03:11 Christian Londono: of the event. So they. They pretty much the.

03:13 Christian Londono: The folks that are putting this together, they, you know, trying to gauge their needs, their interests as they’re coming

03:24 Christian Londono: to the event. And then all the activities are tailored for them in their own specific needs.

03:31 Christian Londono: And going back to the orientation and the engagement, because everything is pretty much made for you and the way

03:40 Christian Londono: that, you know, and we’ll talk about the sessions and the activities are in a very intimate setting.

03:46 Christian Londono: It’s not large groups. It’s not like that big presentation when there’s somebody speaking up there and there’s like 300

03:52 Christian Londono: people in the room. And then people tend to get distracted, or the content might be for, like trying to

03:57 Christian Londono: catch everyone in all agency sizes and any kind of audience.

04:01 Christian Londono: Then it becomes not really for you, but because this is more tailored to you, it’s very engaging.

04:06 Christian Londono: So, you know, first aid orientation, as I mentioned, pretty much asking for everybody to be highly engaged to make

04:14 Christian Londono: the most of it. And then we started with the welcome reception dinner.

04:19 Christian Londono: So that’s pretty much how the event is kickoff.

04:22 Christian Londono: There’s, you know, a little reception and then we have dinner.

04:26 Christian Londono: And this year, Levi, we had the privilege ETA Transit to sponsor that dinner.

04:33 Christian Londono: So, you know, for me, as a ETA Transit employee, it was great to, as I’m meeting people, bring up

04:39 Christian Londono: the fact that we were sponsoring the dinner and see our logo in every place card in every table, and

04:46 Christian Londono: every. Everybody was recognizing our company.

04:50 Christian Londono: So that was very nice. But that was day one, and I really enjoyed that.

04:55 Christian Londono: Was it the same for you when you attended last year?

04:58 Levi McCollum: Yeah, very similar. Of course, there was the orientation and the reception as well.

05:05 Levi McCollum: I think the reception is especially unique because it does give you a smaller group of people to mingle with.

05:14 Levi McCollum: Oftentimes at these types of conferences, you’re just in a room full of hundreds of people.

05:18 Levi McCollum: That’s not really the case with this.

05:21 Levi McCollum: And as a result, it does feel more intimate.

05:24 Levi McCollum: You feel, at least for me anyway, maybe as an introvert, a little bit more open to go and chat

05:30 Levi McCollum: with people and get to know one another.

05:33 Levi McCollum: I was able to meet several people that worked at agencies in places where I had lived before, like in

05:39 Levi McCollum: Arkansas. There were a couple of folks that, you know, I hadn’t even heard of the agencies that they worked

05:47 Levi McCollum: for. And I thought I knew a lot of transit agencies, but, you know, some were just like, wow, okay,

05:51 Levi McCollum: all right, well, tell me about that.

05:53 Levi McCollum: So you get to learn. And also it’s a bit of entertainment.

05:59 Levi McCollum: You Know, the. The people who are.

06:02 Levi McCollum: Are there are. Are curious to learn about what the software vendors or the hardware vendors have available to them.

06:10 Levi McCollum: So. Yeah, a lot of similarities there on that first day.

06:15 Christian Londono: Yeah. And. And I think the.

06:17 Christian Londono: The first day is also interesting because, you know, at least for me, there was a lot of new people.

06:24 Christian Londono: Like, a lot of, you know, transit agency is kind of like a niche kind of industry, but at the

06:30 Christian Londono: same rate is. It’s a lot of people that are part of the industry, and then there’s always somebody new

06:36 Christian Londono: to meet. So that. That first night, that first day is.

06:40 Christian Londono: Is, you know, breaking the ice and starting to make some of those connections.

06:45 Christian Londono: But what’s interesting and, you know, as you go through each one of these days and because each one of

06:50 Christian Londono: the events in the schedule for this summit, they’re tailored to you.

06:57 Christian Londono: Like, you know, the. The dinners, they’re trying to match you where people that are interested about, you know, what

07:03 Christian Londono: a specific vendor has to offer.

07:04 Christian Londono: And it’s mixed. It’s different agencies from different places and then different vend.

07:09 Christian Londono: They’re. They’re. They’re trying to group people based on their interest.

07:13 Christian Londono: So it’s a great conversation right off the bat.

07:16 Christian Londono: Right. Because when you’re going to other conferences, both the vendors and the agencies, they’re not matched based on their

07:23 Christian Londono: interest. So you’re scouting for, you know, who’s the person that might need to hear from you.

07:29 Christian Londono: And then they’re trying to scout for, you know, the.

07:31 Christian Londono: The people that might have the answers to their questions or their.

07:35 Christian Londono: Their needs. So, you know, it’s really good to have that setting where you can meet them and, you know,

07:40 Christian Londono: start developing that relationship.

07:43 Levi McCollum: Yeah, I concur. I think you could see almost immediately how well the thing is set up.

07:48 Unknown: Right.

07:49 Levi McCollum: The event is meticulously planned. What I found to be the most unique about it is exactly what you’re talking

07:58 Levi McCollum: about, where it’s almost like a dating service.

08:00 Levi McCollum: Right. Where they’re kind of mixing and matching who needs a particular item.

08:06 Unknown: Right.

08:07 Levi McCollum: If you’re in procurement for Thing X, Right.

08:10 Levi McCollum: There’s a vendor there that’s also selling Thing X.

08:14 Levi McCollum: I think that that bit of extra work that the conference organizers do that the Transit Bus summit folks do

08:22 Levi McCollum: really facilitates the interaction that happens over the next few days.

08:29 Levi McCollum: So tell me about. Tell me about day two, Christian.

08:32 Levi McCollum: What was day two like? And, you know, were you able to learn a little bit more about some of

08:38 Levi McCollum: the agencies that, you know, you were matched up with? Did you have some good conversations?

08:44 Christian Londono: Yeah. Day two Both day two, on day three, of course, that they’re the full day so you get more

08:52 Christian Londono: action. But they were equally exciting, I think day two, particularly because, you know, we started with a round table

09:00 Christian Londono: breakfast. So you know, you get to kind of like talk to some of the peers and you know, you

09:06 Christian Londono: know, meet some new people. But we went after that into the small group presentation.

09:14 Christian Londono: So all the vendors get to do a 20 minute presentation to a small audience.

09:21 Christian Londono: I think it was like eight to 10 people was the maximum size of the audience.

09:27 Christian Londono: And there’s two presentations. You do one in the morning, one in the afternoon.

09:30 Christian Londono: And not every attendee or representative from the agency side attends all the presentations.

09:38 Christian Londono: So they only go to the presentations of services or technology they’re interested in.

09:46 Christian Londono: So you know, if you’re maybe the director of operations or maintenance, maybe you want to change your seats because

09:54 Christian Londono: people are complaining about the seats and you want to see what’s out there.

09:57 Christian Londono: So maybe in your next bus procurements you’ll choose a different type of seat that will be better for, you

10:04 Christian Londono: know, your rider. So you want to talk to seed manufacturers and talk to all of them and see what’s

10:09 Christian Londono: the latest and greatest. Maybe you’ve been ordering and it happens the same Levi as you know, to, to different

10:13 Christian Londono: transit agencies. They tend to order every year.

10:17 Christian Londono: They’re ordering new buses for, you know, a state of good repair.

10:21 Christian Londono: So any of their fleet that is beyond their useful life, they’re retiring, they’re adding new vehicles.

10:27 Christian Londono: And very often agencies tend to order exactly the same bus that they just order the year before a lot

10:35 Christian Londono: of the times because it’s easier, also easier to maintain, but very often because they don’t have all the, all

10:40 Christian Londono: the knowledge about what’s the latest and greatest, what’s, what’s, what’s out there and then be able to contrast everything

10:47 Christian Londono: and, and then make their mind about the better choice for their constituents and their organization.

10:52 Christian Londono: So this, this is part of that and, and being able to attend those presentations is a very intimate conversation,

10:58 Christian Londono: very short conversation between those vendors and then those agencies.

11:04 Christian Londono: So our presentation, you know, being 20 minutes and you know, ETA transit being, you know, full on cat AVL

11:14 Christian Londono: system with a lot of options and features.

11:16 Christian Londono: You cannot really pack an entire demo of our system in 20 minutes and kind of rush through all the

11:21 Christian Londono: features and do a one size fits all.

11:24 Christian Londono: So that’s not what we went for.

11:26 Christian Londono: But we use the time to let people know about us and then also spark a conversation about their experience

11:34 Christian Londono: with their current vendors and technology.

11:36 Christian Londono: What they know about where they want to go, what’s working, what is not working, which was a really good

11:43 Christian Londono: experience. And then we ended with a video of one of our implementations in you know, the customers actually telling

11:53 Christian Londono: everyone about how it went and specifically about a radio integration.

11:59 Christian Londono: We completed that, you know, they were told that was not possible.

12:03 Christian Londono: So that was, that was very insightful.

12:06 Christian Londono: And Levi, if you don’t mind, I want to tell you about some of the things they told us in

12:12 Christian Londono: regards of their experience with the technology.

12:14 Levi McCollum: Yeah, please do.

12:17 Christian Londono: So something that we’re hearing about a lot or you know, these sessions and, and they were telling us is

12:25 Christian Londono: a lot of them are interested in infotainment.

12:29 Christian Londono: There’s some cases where the infotainment is not matching the audio.

12:33 Christian Londono: There’s some challenges that we heard also hardware reliability.

12:39 Christian Londono: You know, some agencies are complaining that their hardware is not like rugged it for transit or it’s just not

12:47 Christian Londono: very reliable. We also, you know, heard about features not having a full on set of features that will match

12:56 Christian Londono: their needs as an agency. So it’s mixed.

13:00 Christian Londono: There’s some folks that are kind of like content with their services in terms of, you know, card, AVL and

13:07 Christian Londono: all these different add ons, some that are going through challenges with hardware specifically.

13:14 Christian Londono: So altogether having reliable systems and different ones.

13:20 Christian Londono: Speaking about infotainment, it seems to be something that they definitely want to add, you know, to their technology set

13:27 Christian Londono: up and to their constituents. So that was, that was good to hear, that was a good interaction to have.

13:32 Christian Londono: And I would tell you that when we played the video about our radio integration and had those customers talking

13:40 Christian Londono: about that, we had a lot of questions.

13:43 Christian Londono: We have people clapping right after the video and asking about it.

13:48 Christian Londono: And one of the things that I share with them and that I take pride in, ETA Transit is being,

13:55 Christian Londono: you know, as a superpower, just to be a master integrator.

13:59 Christian Londono: The ability that we have to integrate different technologies and even, you know, technologies that agencies are told cannot be

14:07 Christian Londono: integrated is our superpower and is something that a lot of people were interested in because in today’s age, you

14:19 Christian Londono: know, you have to have ecosystem of technologies, right? You have to have different vendors working together and technologies integrated

14:27 Christian Londono: to deliver, you know, the best service to the community.

14:30 Christian Londono: So I think that’s what made that day to, you know, a great day is having that opportunity doing those

14:36 Christian Londono: presentations and having those people learning more about us and us learning about them.

14:42 Levi McCollum: Yeah, the cool thing about that small group setting is that if you’re giving the presentation, you almost get 100%

14:51 Levi McCollum: of the audience capture. Right. Their attention is mostly on you because it’s such a small group that you can’t

15:00 Levi McCollum: really drift away and look at emails or pull open a computer.

15:04 Levi McCollum: It just is too small of a setting to be to allow that.

15:09 Levi McCollum: So that’s interesting that you mentioned it, that you were able to get that much attention and that the people

15:18 Levi McCollum: were following you enough and following the presentation well enough that they’re clapping at the end of the video.

15:25 Levi McCollum: So kudos to you and for the story that you were able to tell there.

15:31 Levi McCollum: Another question that I want to ask you, Christian, is about our brand awareness.

15:36 Levi McCollum: You know, were you able to find anybody there that didn’t know who we were or, you know, maybe conversely,

15:43 Levi McCollum: people that knew exactly who ETA was?

15:47 Christian Londono: You know, Levi, what’s interesting is in two sessions we had two sessions.

15:52 Christian Londono: The first session in the morning, we have, we had one of our current customers and they just want to

16:01 Christian Londono: be part of our session, particularly because they’re proud of being our customer.

16:08 Christian Londono: And actually at the end of our session, you know, without us asking, you know, they jump on to speak

16:17 Christian Londono: on our behalf and how pleased they are with ETA Transit, which is greatly appreciated.

16:23 Christian Londono: But the vast majority of the agencies that we presented to didn’t know much about ETA Transit.

16:30 Christian Londono: And you know, I personally didn’t know of, you know, so.

16:36 Christian Londono: So that was very powerful. Right, because you get to learn about other agencies and what they’re doing and how

16:43 Christian Londono: they’re delivering transit and where they are in their technology journey.

16:48 Christian Londono: Right. Because specifically ETA Transit is.

16:51 Christian Londono: That’s what we provide. Right. Transit technology.

16:53 Christian Londono: So we want to help agencies, agencies build that roadmap and then help them move the needle.

16:59 Christian Londono: So having that opportunity to meet agencies that first they don’t know about us, so they start learning about the

17:05 Christian Londono: services and who we are as a company and then for us to learn about them and how we can

17:11 Christian Londono: help them with the daily delivery of operations using our technology.

17:16 Christian Londono: So that was very powerful.

17:18 Levi McCollum: Yeah. Any unique stories that you have there about an agency that maybe operates a little bit differently or in

17:25 Levi McCollum: an environment that you just wouldn’t expect?

17:32 Christian Londono: No, I, you know, what I would say is this.

17:36 Christian Londono: So there’s, there’s, there’s different setups is you usually have those agencies that are very rural or semi rural and

17:45 Christian Londono: then they’re starting some fixed route and they have like fixed route or like fixed route in some of fixed

17:52 Christian Londono: route flex and then a lot of demand response that they do in different ways.

17:58 Christian Londono: Some of them mixed vehicles for the different services.

18:01 Christian Londono: So that’s kind of like one of the agencies that you find what, what type of agencies and then you

18:07 Christian Londono: have another one that is more like fixed route, you know, whole blown up fixed route.

18:13 Christian Londono: And then they have some micro transit demand response and then they’re trying to see how they can integrate everything.

18:19 Christian Londono: Which was another thing that we heard about different agencies were discussing when we’re talking about customer experience, how, you

18:29 Christian Londono: know, today they have different apps and they have to point their writers to download different apps and how difficult

18:39 Christian Londono: that is. You know, it’s hard to just educate the public about one app, how it works, how they, you

18:44 Christian Londono: know, use it. And then now if you have to point them to different apps that, you know, one doesn’t

18:48 Christian Londono: even hyperlink to the other one, but they have to understand what to do in each.

18:53 Christian Londono: It’s just too much for the writing public.

18:56 Christian Londono: So they, their dream, you know, as we were talking about customer experience in one of the round tables, is

19:02 Christian Londono: that, you know, the, the, the technology sector will provide that one app that will do everything all encompassing instead

19:11 Christian Londono: of like fragmented pieces. The next thing that I will tell you that I heard from them and again, you

19:19 Christian Londono: know, I don’t think there was like any particular case where there was very different.

19:24 Christian Londono: I think they all had a similar, you know, operation or experience, but something else that it came in terms

19:32 Christian Londono: of technology. And you know, you might remember on our, when we were in our days at Pomtor, we discuss

19:40 Christian Londono: about translation device, an onboard translation device.

19:46 Christian Londono: And Levi, this is one I wanted to share with you actually and you know, share with other people at

19:51 Christian Londono: ETA because a lot of these agencies, and it was not me who prompted it, it was, you know, a

19:57 Christian Londono: CEO of a different transit agency, I believe in Alabama.

20:01 Christian Londono: And she said our community has a lot of people, you know, that are from different places that speak different

20:10 Christian Londono: languages. And one wish of our be to have any kind of assistance so that, you know, the drivers could

20:18 Christian Londono: do a quick translation when, you know, they’re trying to give instructions to somebody, explain something very briefly and then

20:24 Christian Londono: they’re there in front of that writer that doesn’t speak any English and they’re not able to communicate.

20:30 Christian Londono: So that was something that, that was also communicated that will be good for transit agencies and, and several transit

20:37 Christian Londono: agencies that were in the same roundtable, they agreed that they will benefit.

20:42 Christian Londono: They say, oh yeah, yeah, we definitely need that.

20:44 Christian Londono: I believe somebody mentioned that they use Google Translate or they use an app that is currently available that they

20:53 Christian Londono: recommend their supervisors to use it when they go inside and they have to Speak with people that don’t speak

20:58 Christian Londono: English. They’re already using one of those translators out there to be able to get the message across.

21:04 Levi McCollum: I see. But on their personal phone, perhaps.

21:07 Levi McCollum: Right.

21:08 Christian Londono: Or I guess it could be a.

21:09 Levi McCollum: County or city device.

21:10 Christian Londono: Yeah, something. Something like that, but.

21:12 Christian Londono: But something very not made for transit.

21:16 Christian Londono: Right. Like something that you just do from the Internet and you kind of, like, make it work.

21:20 Christian Londono: But they said that something nice that will be incorporated as a, you know, in the bus will be beneficial.

21:27 Levi McCollum: Yeah. Well, now we’re giving business ideas on the podcast.

21:30 Levi McCollum: I guess maybe we should reclassify the podcast.

21:35 Christian Londono: Hey, we’ll see. Yeah, I honestly, you know, I want to see it develop because I can see the value

21:42 Christian Londono: of it. And a lot of the communities, the writers, they have writers from different places around the world.

21:47 Christian Londono: And I think it will help, you know, get people where they need to go mitigate a, you know, arguments

21:58 Christian Londono: on a vehicle because of misunderstandings.

22:00 Christian Londono: You know, I’m not. I don’t know what you’re telling me.

22:03 Christian Londono: You’re yelling and screaming that I, you know, I don’t speak the language and then I don’t know what to

22:07 Christian Londono: do. So if there was that Help ease that communication barrier, then it might help everyone.

22:15 Levi McCollum: Yeah. Back to your point about integration, of course, that’s what we feel like we excel at.

22:23 Unknown: Right.

22:23 Levi McCollum: We pride ourselves in integration. Is that a theme that you feel like was probably the most prominent throughout the

22:32 Levi McCollum: conversations that you had with individuals there at the Transit Bus Summit? You know, in other words, is.

22:38 Levi McCollum: Is it the case that vendors just don’t want to work with each other in some cases?

22:45 Christian Londono: I don’t know for sure about that one.

22:48 Christian Londono: What I would think is a lot of the vendors today, and again, this is my personal perception, are more

22:55 Christian Londono: willing to work together than ever before.

22:58 Christian Londono: But. But from the agency standpoint, we do have agencies stating some technologies they have and like and would like

23:08 Christian Londono: to keep. So if they’re doing any technology changes or transitions, you know, I use remix for planning and for

23:15 Christian Londono: doing this and that, and I love it.

23:18 Christian Londono: So pretty much they’re telling you, you know, other aspects of my technology and the things that we have at

23:24 Christian Londono: our agency, we’re willing to change.

23:26 Christian Londono: We’re not in love with these aspects, but this specific technology, we love it.

23:31 Christian Londono: So whenever we decide to move forward, either it’s with you or whomever, you better know that there has to

23:39 Christian Londono: be some integration or that this has to be taken into consideration because we understand, again, is an ecosystem of

23:47 Christian Londono: technologies and they all need to be able to talk to one another and be integrated.

23:51 Christian Londono: And the customers, in this case the transit agencies should have the freedom to see and choose what works best

24:01 Christian Londono: for their agency. Because there’s different factors that take place when it comes to the decision making.

24:06 Christian Londono: You have the budgetary aspect, so maybe there’s a Rolls Royce of whatever solution, but it’s too expensive for them

24:13 Christian Londono: so they, they cannot really afford that.

24:15 Christian Londono: They would love to have that, but maybe they have to choose something that is more appropriate for their budget.

24:21 Christian Londono: Then, then also it has to do with the different types of technology.

24:24 Christian Londono: So if, if they have to have, you know, like you have a head sign, but it has to be

24:29 Christian Londono: integrated to the CAT AVL system and you have announcements that needs to be trigger, you know, specific geospatial location.

24:39 Christian Londono: So all these requires integration. And nowadays from the agency’s part they are asking for more integration.

24:46 Christian Londono: And I think from the vendor side, although there’s been resistance in the past from integrating, I think now they’re

24:55 Christian Londono: coming more a place where it is important to integrate and everybody.

25:00 Christian Londono: There’s a lot of really good players in each different aspect of technology and the agencies recognize it.

25:07 Christian Londono: So the vendor community is definitely being asked to integrate more.

25:15 Levi McCollum: Yeah, well, that is a good thing that vendors are more willing to work together now than ever before.

25:21 Levi McCollum: At least that’s your perception. And it also underscores why open data standards are incredibly important.

25:30 Unknown: Right.

25:30 Levi McCollum: Because that means that there’s interchangeability, there’s interoperability between devices.

25:36 Levi McCollum: So agencies should be aware of that.

25:40 Unknown: Right.

25:41 Levi McCollum: That vendors can provide some interoperability.

25:45 Levi McCollum: And that really should be a default from the vendor and from the agency side.

25:51 Levi McCollum: That should be the expectation. Right.

25:53 Levi McCollum: If I’m Agency X, I want to be sure that if I swap out any of my equipment on my

26:00 Levi McCollum: bus that I’m not losing my data.

26:03 Unknown: Right.

26:04 Levi McCollum: I’m not losing access to some of the information that I previously had.

26:09 Levi McCollum: Or in an ideal world I could just buy the hardware and be able to change vendors, whether it’s a

26:17 Levi McCollum: CAD AVL vendor or you know, whatever technology it is and keep the equipment.

26:23 Unknown: Right.

26:23 Levi McCollum: Because I would own the equipment.

26:26 Levi McCollum: I think that that would be ideal.

26:28 Levi McCollum: I think we’re still quite a ways off from that.

26:31 Levi McCollum: But you know, really the expectations around what the technology vendor can provide or should provide is starting to change

26:42 Levi McCollum: and I think that works to the benefit of the transit agency.

26:45 Levi McCollum: What do you think?

26:46 Christian Londono: No, I agree it’s being demanded by transit agencies.

26:51 Christian Londono: But you know, we have to work together.

26:55 Christian Londono: There’s no other way. And we have to share data with one another.

26:58 Christian Londono: And those standards only help to achieve that because it’s happening across industries, not just in the transit industry.

27:07 Christian Londono: And it’s important also for those transit executives to know what to ask for and what to demand.

27:14 Christian Londono: Because, you know, in government procurement, you’re going to go through our request for proposal and different vendors are going

27:23 Christian Londono: to have the opportunity to participate on the procurement, opportunity to provide the services.

27:28 Christian Londono: But the technology aspect, it’s important to say, I don’t know.

27:33 Christian Londono: When you don’t know something, transit executives are being asked to make all these decisions and they have to select

27:41 Christian Londono: their vendor or their partner for, you know, all these different projects that they have.

27:46 Christian Londono: But particularly, you know, during the summit, we talk about this with, you know, some of the folks that we

27:55 Christian Londono: met with and given some recommendations about the procurement.

27:58 Christian Londono: So first thing is really get educated about the offerings and know what players are out there in the industry

28:05 Christian Londono: and who are they serving. That looks like you.

28:08 Christian Londono: Because, you know, one vendor, one solution might be appropriate for a given community or a type of agency.

28:15 Christian Londono: But if that agency is very different from you, then it doesn’t mean, you know, it might mean that that’s

28:21 Christian Londono: not particularly a solution that might perfectly work for you.

28:24 Christian Londono: So it’s good to understand that piece and learn a lot about the, you know, what’s out there, vendor wise,

28:31 Christian Londono: before you actually go into procurement.

28:33 Christian Londono: So you can actually ask those questions and then be aware of the, you know, you know, the challenges if

28:41 Christian Londono: there’s anything related to owning equipment or owning the data or being able to integrate with other vendors or what

28:48 Christian Londono: happens at the end of the contract and what opportunities I have to transition to a different technology if I

28:53 Christian Londono: have to. I think it’s very important to, you know, understand that prior to any procurement.

28:59 Levi McCollum: Yeah, A large part of the battle there is just knowing what questions to ask.

29:03 Levi McCollum: Right. You could go through the procurement process and think that, man, we chose the right vendor, we got the

29:10 Levi McCollum: technology we wanted, and perhaps during implementation, you think of something that you didn’t happen to think of prior to

29:18 Levi McCollum: the actual deployment. It’s good to have that expertise in your network around you.

29:26 Levi McCollum: People that have experienced similar launches and use them as a resource, or even use the vendor as a resource

29:36 Levi McCollum: or multiple vendors as a resource just to get to understand the technology that you’re going to buy.

29:44 Levi McCollum: The bus is essentially a big piece of technology now.

29:47 Levi McCollum: It has changed so dramatically over the last several years.

29:52 Levi McCollum: What would you say, Christian, would be the overall takeaway, if you had just one sentence to say the Transit

29:59 Levi McCollum: bus summit for 2025 in Jacksonvill was, was this, what would that be?

30:07 Christian Londono: Personalized insight into the transit industry.

30:12 Levi McCollum: I like that.

30:13 Christian Londono: Yeah, I think, I think that like we said, they start by knowing your specific needs and wants out of

30:20 Christian Londono: the summit. And then every experience that you go through, it is tailored to you.

30:25 Christian Londono: So, so I, I, for the most part myself, I, I got to learn a lot about a lot of

30:32 Christian Londono: agencies that we would love to work with and learn particularly about their operations and how we can better offer

30:39 Christian Londono: services to, you know, help them provide their everyday transit service.

30:45 Christian Londono: And I think they got to learn about us and, and overall technology that would help, you know, serve better

30:51 Christian Londono: their community. So I think it’s all together 100 recommended event.

30:56 Christian Londono: And I do think that there, there should be a little bit more of that speed dating and, and, and,

31:02 Christian Londono: and matching. Apply to other conferences that are out there where it will help people better connect to those opportunities

31:12 Christian Londono: in that learning that they’re seeking.

31:16 Levi McCollum: Yeah, I think you’re absolutely right.

31:19 Levi McCollum: If you applied that type of matchmaking to other conferences, I feel like they’d be more impactful, that people would

31:26 Levi McCollum: have more to take away from it than just tchotchkes and buses.

31:31 Levi McCollum: You know, sometimes it feels like that’s all you get out of a conference, but in this one there’s just

31:38 Levi McCollum: so much more. So, you know, I want to thank our listeners for tuning in.

31:42 Levi McCollum: I know this conversation was all about Transit Bus Summit, but it’s, it was an experience that Christian had recently

31:49 Levi McCollum: that I had last year. So, you know, thanks for checking out this episode.

31:55 Levi McCollum: Christian. Where can people go to learn more about Transit Bus Summit if they’re interested?

31:59 Christian Londono: So the information about next year’s, which usually happens about, you know, September, I mean, February, that, that’s a, that’s

32:08 Christian Londono: when the summit takes place. The information is on the website.

32:13 Christian Londono: You can find it at transitbussummit.com.

32:18 Levi McCollum: Excellent. Cool. Well, for those of you who are planning on attending next year, you know, perhaps we’ll see you there.

32:24 Levi McCollum: If you’re not, then take a look into it and let us know what you think and we will catch

32:30 Levi McCollum: you next Monday. Thank you so much for listening.

32:32 Christian Londono: Thank you for listening.