The arrival display is a 27- to 43-inch outdoor LCD rated 2500 nits (sunlight-readable) or, for off-grid sites, an e-paper panel with sub-second refresh and 0.5 W average draw. Both connect to GTFS-Realtime feeds via CAT-M / NB-IoT cellular with an LTE-M fallback. We support every Canadian transit-authority API (TTC, STM, TransLink, OC Transpo, Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Halifax) and provide the integration playbook with each shipment.
Sensor payload includes a passenger-count sensor (3D ToF, 95% accuracy), an air-quality sensor (PM2.5, PM10, CO₂, temperature, humidity), a dwell-time analytics module, and an anti-tamper accelerometer that flags the shelter to ops if it's struck or shifted. Rider-facing services are a USB-C charging panel (4 ports × 3 A), a Qi wireless pad, optional municipal Wi-Fi, and an emergency call button (SIP-over-cellular to 911 or a private security desk).
The data plane is a small Linux SBC (industrial Raspberry Pi or NVIDIA Jetson Nano for AI workloads) running our open-source telemetry agent, MQTT-published to your transit-authority's data lake or to our hosted dashboard. 5-year SLA on cellular and dashboard, 3-year warranty on electronics. Smart shelters start at $15,000 for the structure and add $3,000–$8,000 for the sensor payload and connectivity.
Integration, hosting, and warranty
Smart-shelter onboarding is a 2-day workshop with your transit-authority IT team where we hand off the GTFS-Realtime integration, MQTT topic schema, dashboard credentials, and API documentation for every sensor stream. Hosting options are (a) BusShelters.ca cloud (AWS Canada Central, $240/year per shelter, includes 5-year SLA on data ingest and dashboard uptime), (b) self-host on your data lake (free; we provide the open-source agent and Helm chart), or (c) hybrid, where telemetry hits both. Warranty is 10 years on the structure, 3 years on the LCD/e-paper display, 5 years on the cellular modem, 3 years on sensors, and 2 years on rider-services electronics (USB / Qi / call button). Cellular data is $8/month per shelter on a pooled Canadian carrier plan. Firmware updates are OTA, signed and rolled per shelter cohort. For pilot deployments under 10 shelters we offer a 3-month evaluation programme with full hardware on loan, dashboard access, and a written case-study report at the end — most pilots convert to full procurement within the same fiscal year.
> Key Takeaway: Climate-rated, AODA-compliant, and stamped-engineered for Canadian transit deployment — full procurement documentation included.