“Where Is the Bus?” App Can Track Buses: Four HSTU Students Develop ‘HSTU Bus Koi’

Students at Hajee Mohammad Danesh Science and Technology University (HSTU) can now find out the current location of a campus bus and how long it will take to reach the next stop with just a click on their phones. Four students from the 2023 batch of the university’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering (CSE) have developed a bus-tracking app and website called “HSTU Bus Koi” to make campus transportation more convenient. The system has already successfully completed trial runs on university buses.

The four student developers are Mahmudul Hasan Ebin, Ahnaf Adil Soumik, Mohiuddin Mehedi, and Inan Ahmed. Their project was supervised by Dr. Md. Abdullah Al Mamun, a professor in the CSE Department, and Hasanul Karim Rony, an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering (EEE).

According to the students, the app will provide buses’ live locations and current speeds. Users will be able to see when a particular bus is expected to arrive at a specific stop, how long it will take to travel from one stop to another, and how long they will have to wait for the next bus to leave a particular stop. The app will also show whether a specific bus is currently operating or out of service. The students said the buses’ locations and speeds are updated every three to five seconds.

The developers also highlighted another feature of the system. They said artificial intelligence (AI) can be used to count passengers on buses, allowing users to see how crowded a bus is through the app.

The idea for the project began around November last year. Ahnaf Adil Soumik said he got the idea after seeing a “red bus” and wondering whether something similar could be developed for HSTU.

“That is where it started. The four of us have been working on it for nearly a year. Under Mamun Sir’s supervision, we built the devices, website, and app ourselves. We went to many places and tried many times, but we never stopped. Alhamdulillah, we conducted several trials on buses and found that our system actually works in real-world conditions,” he said.

The students now want to hand over the project to the university’s Transport Section if they receive administrative approval.

Soumik said, “Our only wish is that this should not remain just a project. We want it to genuinely serve HSTU and, one day, be put to practical use in the university’s transportation system.”