ITS Upper Austria
The goal of the ITS Upper Austria project is the operation and further development of a real-time traffic situation image for the province of Upper Austria. RISC Software GmbH and the FH OÖ Logistikum Steyr are working on the implementation. In the course of the project, RISC Software GmbH is responsible for the operation of the database infrastructure, the efficient input of real-time traffic data and the enabling of high-performance real-time queries.
These queries are time-critical, since a real-time traffic situation or forecast of the traffic situation that is delivered late – for example, for the next quarter of an hour – no longer has any novelty character. Thanks to the optimization of the database and algorithms implemented by RISC Software GmbH, it is possible to provide the traffic forecast for all of Upper Austria for the next quarter of an hour in a timely manner. The forecast is based on real-time collected and anonymized position data of fleet vehicles (e.g. service vehicles of the province of Upper Austria, the ÖAMTC or the Upper Austrian Transport Association), as well as data from stationary traffic counters (side radars, induction loops) and Bluetooth sensors.
The real-time traffic situation and traffic forecasts are made available to the population, for example, through services provided by Verkehrsauskunft Österreich (VAO).
History / Development
The Austrian project EVIS.AT (Real-Time Traffic Information Road Austria, duration 2015-2022) is a pioneering initiative to improve traffic information on Austria’s roads. It was developed to provide road users with up-to-date and precise information about the traffic situation, planned and unplanned events (e.g. road works or accidents) as well as traffic forecasts in real time. In the third quarter of 2022, EVIS.AT was put into operation and has since been operated within the framework of a public-public cooperation with a total of 19 operating partners (all 9 federal provinces, BMK, BMI, ASFINAG, ITS Vienna Region, Salzburg Research Forschungs GmbH, RISC Software GmbH, FH OÖ Logistikum, Verkehrsauskunft Österreich VAO GmbH and the cities of Vienna and Graz). As part of the EVIS.AT operating consortium, the public-public cooperation ITS Upper Austria, consisting of the Province of Upper Austria, the FH OÖ Logistikum and RISC Software GmbH, assumes the tasks within the framework of EVIS.AT for the road network in Upper Austria.
Overview & Tasks
The provision of real-time traffic information plays a crucial role in providing road users with up-to-date and accurate data and in improving the efficiency of traffic management. However, the generation of reliable and high-quality real-time traffic information is a complex task that depends on various influencing factors. These include the acquisition, harmonization and cleansing of extensive traffic information with heterogeneous data structures from different sensor types. The selection of suitable database systems is essential, especially with regard to the efficient storage and processing of data and the performance of analyses. The goal of the ITS Upper Austria project is the operation of the ITS system as well as the further development of the real-time traffic situation and forecast for the province of Upper Austria.
The tasks of RISC Software GmbH consist roughly of the collection of traffic data, the efficient processing and preparation, the storage and in the last instance the provision of this data via defined interfaces. The Logistikum is responsible for the qualitative and quantitative analysis of the traffic data as well as the graphical processing of the results.
Data processing & storage
The extraction of information from big data has also become increasingly important in the transport sector in recent years. In order to be able to provide applications of logistics service providers with real-time information about travel times, forecasts, accidents and road works on Austria’s roads, the entire chain of acquisition, transmission, consolidation, storage and processing must function quickly and efficiently.
Within the ITS Upper Austria cooperation, GPS-based floating cars (FC), side radars, induction loops and Bluetooth detectors for traffic data collection are obtained via various interfaces.
Overview of sensor technology (Bluetooth in blue and stationary in green) for (right) Upper Austria and (left) Greater Linz; screenshot from TESS.
Before the data can be used, it must be checked for plausibility, cleaned and anonymized before it is written to the database. For example, the position data from the different FC fleets may be in different coordinate systems. Some GPS receivers send wrong speed data, are too inaccurate due to bad reception or use different time zones.
For the storage of sensor data in the traffic position system of ITS Upper Austria since 2022, different storage options were evaluated by RISC Software GmbH. These include the relational database PostgreSQL, the time series databases TimescaleDB and Prometheus, and the NoSQL database HBase based on Hadoop. As a result of the evaluation, a Postgres database with Citus extension (Citus cluster) was used for further development of the system. The versatility and easy adaptability of this solution for future problems represents a significant advantage. Based on this analysis, Citus was selected as a scalable extension to the existing SQL database and incorporated into the ITS system. By partitioning tables and adding indexes, it was possible to improve the performance of database queries by significantly reducing the number of disk accesses.
Based on the different traffic data, real-time travel times, short- and long-term forecasts and different daily hydrographs are calculated. In this process, the data collection and distribution system (DSVS), which was created as part of the EVIS.AT cooperation and is operated by Asfinag, acts as an interface for traffic data. RISC Software GmbH harmonizes the traffic data for Upper Austria and imports it automatically via the DSVS interface. In this way, RISC Software GmbH contributes to the availability of an up-to-date and harmonized traffic situation throughout Austria.
Visualization of traffic data quality
Efficient data management and reliable storage of traffic data are the basis for precise analyses. However, data management is not just about the pure administration of data, but also about ensuring the validity of traffic information. In this context, the quality check of traffic data is becoming increasingly important. To ensure correct interpretation and make informed decisions regarding corrective actions in traffic sensing, meaningful data visualizations can help. By using various dashboard solutions and data visualization tools, patterns are identified and targeted actions are taken to improve data quality. The visualization and review of the data quality is performed by our partner FH OÖ Logistikum.
Value added
Finally, the ITS Upper Austria project must be viewed as a component of a larger system. For example, traffic data is collected by the VAO via the DSVS and fed into various services and information systems. Among other things, VAO offers multimodal traffic information for all citizens of Austria. When entering a route, users can quickly get an overview of which means of transport can be used to reach the desired destination in which time thanks to multimodality. Among other things, it is hoped that this will make public transport more attractive. Traffic data from ITS Upper Austria is used in the calculation of a route to take into account both the current and forecast traffic situation.
Another non-public result of the project is the software TESS (Traffic Evaluation & Sensor Statistics). This program enables the query and visualization of traffic data and can be used, among other things, for the qualitative evaluation of the data. The data focus is on aggregated (daily hydrographs, V85), historical and forecast traffic data. For example, to check the internal data quality, the calculated forecast data can be compared with the actual speed values. For traffic planning, for example, a vehicle count, which can be performed and compared in different months or days of the week, can also be of interest.
In addition to the direct use of traffic data in various applications, the ITS Upper Austria project aims to strengthen Austria’s data sovereignty.
Additional links
Projekt EVIS.AT: The EVIS.AT project was made possible by funding from the Climate and Energy Fund KliEn. The funding was provided in the 2014 annual program (program line Transport), program “Innovation for Green and Efficient Mobility – Implementation Measures under the National Action Plan for Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS)”. The project ended in October 2022 and the activities, systems and offers were transferred to permanent regular operation.
RISC Software current traffic situation for Upper Austria
Project Details
- Project short title: ITS-UA
- Project long title: ITS Upper Austria: Betrieb von EVIS.AT in Oberösterreich
- Projektpartner: Logistikum
- Budget volume (total): 1.35 Mio EUR
- Duration: 01.01.2022 – 30.06.2026
Contact
Project management
Mag. Stefanie Kritzinger-Griebler, PhD
Head of Unit Logistics Informatics