The days of struggling with public transport routes and missing a bus or train are a thing of the past, thanks to a simple online application.
Lebogang Nkoane, a 36-year-old computer scientist from Tsutsumani developed an application, awayto.be, which makes life easier for public transport commuters. Nkoane was first struck by the idea in 2004 when his uncle was involved in a car accident and he (Nkoane) had to rely on public transport.
“I lived in Killarney and was not familiar with the way buses worked, that made my life difficult,” Nkoane said. He could not develop the application then due to financial and technological constraints.
With patience and hours of code writing, the website went live in 2012 and people could access public transport routes in Johannesburg, Cape Town and Pretoria using the Gautrain, Rea Vaya and MyCiTi routes.
Using the application people can know the time that their bus or train leaves. Nkoane is yet to meet with taxi associations to discuss the routes they use, although he admits it would be a challenge. “Taxis don’t stop at a specific route but they have their main routes,” he said. Taxi routes that can be accessed currently are Sandton, Rosebank, CBD, and Alexandra, including local routes.
Nkoane studied computer science at Wits University and his honours degree at the University of Pretoria. “I did management of innovation, which was more theoretical but it inspired a lot of thoughts for me,” he said.
He founded his company 2LMN Research and Development in 2004 and has created a number of websites which received Loeries and Bookmark awards. In 2011, awayto.be was shortlisted for innovation at a tech4africa conference.
Nkoane is passionate about his work and admitted that he was the happiest man when he wrote codes. “Once an idea hits me, I cannot sleep until I complete it,” he said. His goal is to see the application grow and eventually be able to provide routes for all modes of transport all over Africa.
