RITIS Standards Evaluation & Usage

Presented at the NCRREGIONAL ITS ARCHITECTURE WORKING GROUP

By

Jason EllisonNovember 3, 2007

What are ITS Standards?

• ITS Standards are technical documents that describe how communication takes place between multiple systems.

• ITS Standards provide guidance on what data should and can be exchanged.

Why use standards?

• Interoperability– Seamless integration with commercial off-the-shelf (COTS)

software.– Cross agency and jurisdiction data sharing and mining.– Avoids vendor lock-in.

• Consistency– Build upon prior deployments knowledge and experience.– Harmonizes certain data types (such as event types) between

agencies and jurisdictions.

• Transparency– Allows the same performance measures to be applied to multiple

systems.– Provides the base for a link to 511 and other ISPs.

State of ITS Standards

• Broad– Not always practical or necessary to implement entire

standard.

• Overlapping– May define differing ways to represent the same data.– Lack of harmonization between components in

standards.

• Flexible– Consist of many optional requirements.– Can be mixed and combined to meet a deployments

operational needs.

Core RITIS Standards

• SAE J2354 “Message Set for Advanced Traveler Information System (ATIS)”

• ITE “Traffic Management Data Dictionary (TMDD)” v2.1

• IEEE Incident Management (IM) Standards

• ASTM WK7604 “Standard Specifications for Archiving ITS-Generated Traffic Monitoring Data” (ADUS)

SAE J2354 (ATIS)

• Purpose – Provides for one and two-way communication

between an Information Service Provider (ISP) and a data consumer.

– Generally covers all data considered to be valuable to the public.

• Status: – Version 2 adopted February 2004. – Version 3 under active development.

ATIS Coverage

• Traveler Information– Event and Incident status– Weather data– Basic transit data– Parking information and lot status– Searchable points of interest directory– Trip routing

RITIS ATIS Applications

• Current– Incident Data– Event Data

• Near Future– Weather Alerts

ATIS (cont.)

• Pros– Actively undergoing further development.– Most complete of the major standards.– Highly extendable and customizable while remaining

consistent across deployments.– Remedial filtering abilities.

• Cons– Lacks device control messages for C2C

communication.– Basic detector data and no other devices such as

DMS.– Does not provide for response status.

Standards within ATIS• SAE Location Referencing Messaging Standard (LRMS)

• ITE TMDD

• IEEE IM 1512

• NTCIP 1204 Environmental Sensor Station Interface Standard (ESS)

• APTA Transit Communications Information Profile (TCIP)

• SAE J2540 International Traveler Information Systems (ITIS) Phrase List

TMDD v2.1

• Purpose– Provide event and incident data to external Traffic

Management Centers (TMC)– Communicate with and control remote devices such

as DMS, CCTV, and traffic detectors

• Status – Version 2 adopted in 2003. – Version 2.1 has been up for ballot since 2005. – Version 3 recently began development.

RITIS TMDD Applications

• Current– Detector Data and Status– Detector Device Inventory

• Near Future– DMS Data and Status– DMS Device Inventory– Incident Data

TMDD Issues

• Cons– Not logically extensible– Unclear development plan– Ambiguous lane representation – Secondary incidents are nested instead of just

referenced– Outdated references to other standards especially

LRMS– Missing request\response messages– No filtering– Needs to address multi-agency shared incidents and

device control

Other Standards Used by TMDD

• SAE LRMS

• NTCIP 1204 ESS

• SAE J2540 ITIS Phrase List

• SAE J2354 Message Sets for ATIS

IEEE Incident Management 1512 (IM)

• Purpose– Defines the exchange of data between transportation

and public safety agencies during an incident– Provides for resource management and situational

awareness

• Status– 1512 Common Incident Messages

• Adopted June 2000

– 1512.1 Traffic Incident Management Message• Adopted in March 2003• Version 2 currently in balloting

RITIS IM Applications

• Future– Incident Data– Responder Status– Equipment/Resource Status

ASTM WK7604 Archiving Traffic Monitoring Data (ADUS)

• Purpose– Provide database elements and connections

for traffic network data collected by sensors and probes

• Status– Currently under active development– Not adopted or even up for ballot yet

ADUS RITIS Application

• No draft or final document, so standard cannot be adopted

• RITIS database layout inspired by ongoing membership and communication with the ASTM working group.

• Found that standard might cause serious database performance issues if adopted in its current state.

Other Notable Standards

• NTCIP C2C

• VDOT VTRC Incident Standard

• TransXML

• Justice XML

NTCIP C2C Standard

• Purpose– To standardize and document communication

methods for TMDD– Define Web Services Descriptor Language

(WSDL) endpoints and wrapper messages to facilitate transportation of TMDD XML

• Status– Currently under development– Being applied to the next ATIS version

VDOT VTRC Incident Standard

• Defines 15 key data elements that should be stored

• Supports statewide communication and performance measures

• Harmonizes elements across systems

• Does not provide guidance on or define messaging wrappers.

NCHRP TransXML

• Purpose:– Survey/Roadway Design– Transportation Construction/Materials– Highway Bridge Structures– Transportation Safety

• Status:– Initial schemas and report filed in Sept 2006– Seeking stewardship to continue development

and maintenance

Global Justice XML Data Model (JXDM)

• Purpose– Sponsored by the Department of Justice– Covers data exchanges within the public

safety and Department of Justice communities

• Status– IJIS Working group has been formed to fold

IEEE 1512 into the Global JXDM

Standard Deployments

*Table From ITS Users Group October 13-14, 2005 Meeting Summary Page 12

Roadblocks to Adoption• No official central repository of master schemas and revisions

• No efficient way to certify that a vendor’s product or deployment is standards compliant

• DRM on SAE and other SDO documents requires that schemas must be retyped or downloaded from “unofficial” sources

• SDO’s have different development cycles leading to outdated and missing elements between standards

• Official SDO development tool, “Mini-Edit”, buggy and lacks documentation

• Documentation and programming guides not up to date with the latest versions of the standards

• Not always beneficial to vendors\consultants

Conclusions

• RITIS is attempting to incorporate the best standards that show the most potential.

• Some “adjustments” to the standards will be made to accommodate regional data sharing requirements.

• The region would be better served by having each TMC work together during software development to agree on common incident types, naming conventions, severity levels, location referencing, etc.

Questions

For additional information contact

Jason Ellison

jjelliso@umd.edu

301-403-2971