You are a city transportation planner and are interested in improving the city's bus service. What types of analytic tools might help you do this, and how would you use them?

What will be an ideal response?

To help plan an efficient bus system you could use some kind of decision support system (DSS). Ideally, you will want to use predictive analytics to see how potential changes in the service would affect various elements such as riders and speed. You could use big data predictive modeling and location analytics to gain insight from existing service and routes and prioritize service. In addition, there are some intelligent techniques you might use - fuzzy logic systems (how long a bus could stay at a single stop, or at the terminus, for different conditions, such as weather). You might be able to use a neural network or genetic algorithms to optimize bus routes and schedules. You could also use intelligent agents to model the behavior of customers, buses, other traffic, to simulate different conditions in the bus system environment and perform what-if analyses.