Pavia’s night bus stopped asking riders to book the day before
Noctibus took bookings by phone or text a day ahead, and few people used it. Autoguidovie made it fully on demand in the app, across 313 virtual stops, and passengers per day doubled.
- Setting
- Pavia, 24 km² urban area
- Operator
- Autoguidovie, funded by the City of Pavia
- Hours
- 20:00–01:00, every night, running since 2010
- Booking
- Miobus app (white label), up to 14 days ahead
Results
From 10 to 20 a night once booking moved from phone and text to the app.
Young people make up about 70% of riders, alongside night-shift workers and women travelling alone.
Of 1,765 rides analysed, 85% were collected within 15 minutes of the requested time. Half were on the minute, and the average was about 2 minutes late.
The challenge
Real demand at night, and a booking system from another era
Pavia is a university town. A large student population and the city’s night-shift workers mean the demand after dark is real — but it swings from night to night, which makes fixed routes and timetables expensive to run and hard to plan.
Noctibus already existed as a demand-responsive night bus, but riders had to book the day before by phone or text message, and operators typed each booking into a spreadsheet by hand. It was on demand in name only, and few people used it.
What we deployed
The same night bus, booked in the app and routed through the old town
- 01Booking in the Miobus app
A white-label app, bookable from 14 days to 30 minutes ahead. In the first six months, 94% of rides were scheduled in advance.
- 02313 virtual stops
Across the whole 24 km² urban area, 13 per km², so riders are dropped close to their door.
- 03Custom street maps
Bus-only streets and bridges in the historic centre, added so drivers can use them.
- 04Pickup windows
The exact time is confirmed an hour before, with a reminder the day before and live tracking from 15 minutes out. Repeated no-shows suspend an account for a week.
Custom maps for a historic centre
Parts of Pavia’s historic centre are closed to private cars but open to buses — the Ponte Coperto northbound, Strada Nuova. Standard map data routes around them, so Shotl built custom street maps that let the Driver App navigate the whole city the way a bus is allowed to.
How the assignment rules workOn site
Riders choose any of the city’s bus stops in the app. The station is the busiest: nearly one in five rides starts there. 
The Driver App routes through streets only buses may use. 
94% of riders book ahead in the app, planning the ride home around the night out.
Monica MarconiHead of On-demand Services, Autoguidovie“Noctibus already ran on demand, but booking a day ahead by phone kept most people away. Once riders could book in the app, choosing their own time and stop across the city, passengers per day doubled.”
“Most of them are young people heading home at night, and the railway station became the heart of the service.”
Similar towns
The problem isn’t specific to Pavia
Any university town has the same pattern: students leaving late, shift workers finishing at the hospital, and demand that moves from night to night. In Pavia the busiest stops were the station, the university campus and the Maugeri hospital, and bookings peaked between 22:00 and 23:00.
Where the pattern holds, so does the model: one zone covering the whole town, virtual stops close to home, and bookings made in the app on the evening itself. The same operator, Autoguidovie, runs a daytime rural service in Stradella on the same platform.
Group commutingStaff shuttleCitylink Shuttle
KuwaitAn on-demand shuttle network for staff movement across the city.
Demand responsiveNight servicePiacenza
ItalyAn on-demand night bus that replaced fixed loops running near-empty.
Demand responsive×20 ridersVimercate
ItalyTwo near-empty circular lines withdrawn and the whole municipality covered on demand.