Ride-hailing service Uber is set to launch a free tool known as ‘Uber Movement’ in London, which uses the apps’s anonymised data from several trips to help urban planners make decisions about their city.

The launch comes after Uber collected feedback from the cities it operates and learnt that access to some of its aggregated data could help inform transport policy and future investments.

Uber plans to share data gathered from the millions of GPS-tracked trips made by its cars in London in a bid to meet requests from Transport for London (TfL), which refused to issue a private hire operator licence.

Last September, TfL said that it will not issue the licence to Uber London after expiry of its existing licence that month.

“With the help of the new tool, people in London will be able to compare past travel conditions across different times of day, days of the week, or months of the year.”

The regulator concluded that the company is not fit and proper to hold such a licence to operate in London.

With the help of the new tool, people in London will be able to compare past travel conditions across different times of day, days of the week, or months of the year.

Furthermore, the tool allows people to see how journey times in different parts of the city are impacted by any major events, road closures or infrastructure investment.

Uber’s tool will be regularly updated with new data to help the city also examine the positive impact of future investments.

Over the next few months, the tool is planned to be launched in other cities such as Manchester and Birmingham.