Two Aberystwyth students have won a national competition for their app which helps improve access to train stations.

Hosted by the Rail Data Marketplace and Rail Industry Association, the competition invited entrants to propose ideas to tackle two challenges: predicting how long it will take to resolve a rail disruption or making rail travel easier for passengers with accessibility needs.

Jonathan Turnbull and Oscar Tikadar, final year students in the Department of Computer Science, competed against individuals, university teams and commercial organisations to win the accessibility challenge with their concept for an app that makes rail travel easier for passengers with accessibility needs.

LogMyStation allows users to log UK train stations that they have visited and easily locate important station information, such as accessibility details, facilities, and live departures.

The Aberystwyth team was shortlisted to pitch their concept to the judges in a 15-minute ‘Dragons' Den’-style presentation, held at the Railway Industry Association Innovation Conference in Newport last month.

The pair impressed the judging panel of industry leaders from the likes of Network Rail, Great British Railways, and the Department for Transport.

Oscar, a third-year student in Computer Science & Physical Geography, said: “As well as being a valuable resource to help passengers to more easily navigate the UK’s railways, one of the more novel aspects of LogMyStation is the gameability factor.

“Users can ‘collect’ stations by recording their visit in the app and are then able to view the stations they have visited on a map, along with any comments they record.”

Jonathan, who is in the final year of a Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence degree, said: “We are thrilled to have won the competition, which was a great opportunity to showcase our idea to industry experts.

“We are very grateful to the judges and can’t wait to further develop our idea.”