Hong Kong’s public transport comprises taxis, the Mass Transit Railway (MTR), buses, minibuses, and tramways. Although the MTR is government-owned, it is run like a commercial line, and each of the other transport operators are privately owned. Hong Kong’s 2017 Smart City Blueprint emphasised the need to integrate data sharing in public transport with a focus on intermodal transportation. How can the city increase the currently limited data sharing that occurs between providers?

Athena Infonomics conducted a case study on the Public Transport Exchange Data Trust, an initiative housed at Hong Kong University that was established as a proof of concept to overcome barriers in real-time data-sharing based on a trusted third-party model that encouraged data controllers (public transport operators) to securely share their data related to arrivals and departures from a public transport exchange hub called the Exchange Square Public Transport Interchange. This case study was developed as part of Effective Data Sharing: Beyond Platforms, a report commissioned by the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data that investigates the landscape of data-sharing partnerships and identifies the key drivers of success.