Report Short Name, Date

ANACONDA

Specification of the COBRA+ Monitor

Deliverable No2.1

October 2016

Page 1 of 15

Call 2014: Mobility and ITS

Project Nr. 850708

Project acronym: ANACONDA

Project title:

Assessment of user Needs for Adapting COBRAincluding ONline DAtabase

Deliverable No2.1 – Specification of the COBRA+ Monitor

Due date of deliverable: 31.03.2016

Actual submission date: 31.10.2016

Start date of project: 01.09.2015End date of project: 28.02.2017

Author(s) this deliverable:

Simon Ball, Jean Hopkin, Andy Wells, Peter Vermaat, Alan Stevens (Transport Research Laboratory, UK)

Kerry Malone, Aroen Soekroella, Martijn de Kievit (TNO, the Netherlands)

Philippe Nitsche, Isabela Mocanu, Klemens Schwieger, Stephan Wittmann (AIT Austrian Institute of Technology, Austria)

Version: 0.08 – Draft

Page 1 of 31

Call 2014: Mobility and ITS

Executive summary

Current Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) share information and data using either Vehicle to Infrastructure (V2I) and/or Vehicle to Vehicle (V2V) communication. The systems can provide advice, warnings or take actions with the objective of improving safety, sustainability, efficiency and comfort, thus contributing to a road authority’s objectives. However, to keep up with the fast development of C-ITS, road authorities are confronted with various challenges, such as determining the role that the road authority must play in the interaction between automotive manufacturers and information providers, investing in a cost-beneficial way in roadside infrastructure to support the information provision between vehicles and infrastructure, positioning of road authorities across CEDR countries towards C-ITS.

The “Assessment of user needs for adapting COBRA including online database” (ANACONDA) project builds on the results of the previous COBRA project and aims to position COBRA+ as a major tool for decision- support for deployment of C-ITS for National Road Authorities (NRAs). The COBRA+ tool builds on the strengths of the original COBRA tool. COBRA is a decision support tool in the form of a spreadsheet that enables NRAs to compare the costs and monetised benefits of C-ITS in various contexts to support investment decisions under different deployment scenarios. The new COBRA+ tool will be enhanced with new functionalities, greater geographic coverage and more flexibility and therefore updated to meet the requirements of users who, having made use of the COBRA tool, have a clear idea of what may be improved and enhanced.

This deliverable sets out the specification of the COBRA+ Monitor which accompanies the COBRA+ tool. It should be read in conjunction with ANACONDA deliverable D3.1 (Specification of the COBRA+ Tool).

This specification document starts by summarising the requirements for the COBRA+ Monitor which were gathered from potential users of the COBRA+ tool. It sets out the six key functions of the Monitor which are defined in terms of the six key questions, which the Monitor is intended to help NRAs to answer:

  1. Who is using the COBRA+ tool, what scenarios are they conducting and what outputs are they obtaining?
  2. What user-defined inputs are being used in the COBRA+ tool, e.g. different cost data?
  3. What is the experience of users of the COBRA+ tool?
  4. What are the impacts of different C-ITS services and bundles, measured in terms of indicators within the COBRA+ tool?
  5. What are the impacts of different C-ITS services and bundles, measured in terms of indicators not within the COBRA+ tool, from other ad hoc data sources?
  6. What strategic plans are there for C-ITS in different countries?

This specification provides a brief diagrammatic overview of the way in which the COBRA+ Monitor works, a description of the key functions, the web site and the online database that will support the web site.

Table of contents

1Introduction

2Summary of requirements to be addressed

2.1Requirements collection......

2.2Functionality / Questions the COBRA+ Monitor will attempt to answer......

3Overview of COBRA+ Monitor

3.1Data sources for each function......

3.2Data flows......

4Functionality of the website

4.1[A] Scenario-specific data (output from the COBRA+ tool)......

4.2[B] User-defined input data (output from the COBRA+ tool)......

4.3[C] User feedback on experiences (optional user survey)......

4.4[D] Impact assessment data (D3 from previous COBRA project and also updated data in COBRA+)

4.5[E] Ad hoc impact data sources (shared by individual users via a web form, with email alerts)

4.6[F] Survey of CEDR members (one-off online survey)......

5Website details

5.1Hosting......

5.2Website look and feel......

5.2.1[A] Scenario-specific data......

5.2.2[B] User-defined input data......

5.2.3[C] User feedback on experiences......

5.2.4[D] Impact assessment data......

5.2.5[E] Ad hoc impact data sources......

5.2.6[F] Survey of CEDR members......

6Database details and upload procedures

6.1Overview......

6.2[A] UploadScenario() function......

6.2.1Data flows......

6.2.2Table: T_Scenarios - uploaded scenario-specific data......

6.2.3Table: T_Graphs - uploaded graphs......

6.3[B] UploadUDI(UDI_Identifier) function......

6.3.1Data flows......

6.3.2Table T_UDI – uploaded user specific data......

6.4[C] Feedback webpages......

6.5[E] Ad hoc impact data sources......

7References

Annex A.Preliminary requirements for COBRA+ Monitor......

Annex B.Examples of graphs exported to COBRA+ Monitor......

List of tables

Table 1 – Example table for scenario-specific data

Table 2 – Example table for user-defined data

Table 3 – Fields in database table 'T_Scenarios'

Table 4 - Fields in database table ‘T_Graphs’

Table 5 – Fields in database table ‘T_UDI’

List of figures

Figure 1 – Overall system operation

Figure 2 – Example of user-defined input data within the COBRA+ spreadsheet

Figure 3 – Example of feedback form

Figure 4 – Example of main web page for uploaded scenarios

Figure 5 – Example of more detail available for each scenario

Figure 6 – Example interface for user-defined inputs

Figure 7 – Example of feedback received web page

Figure 8 – Example of impact assessment web page

Figure 9 – Example of ad hoc impact assessment web page

Figure 10 – Class diagram

Figure 11 – Sequence diagram for the UploadScenario() function

Figure 12 – Sequence diagram for the UploadUDI(UDI_INDEX) function

1Introduction

Current Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) share information and data using either Vehicle to Infrastructure (V2I) and/or Vehicle to Vehicle (V2V) communication. The systems can provide advice, warnings or take actions with the objective of improving safety, sustainability, efficiency and comfort, thus contributing to a road authority’s objectives. However, to keep up with the fast development of C-ITS, road authorities are confronted with various challenges, such as determining the role that the road authority must play in the interaction between automotive manufacturers and information providers, investing in a cost-beneficial way in roadside infrastructure to support the information provision between vehicles and infrastructure, positioning of road authorities across CEDR countries towards C-ITS.

The “Assessment of user needs for adapting COBRA including online database” (ANACONDA) project builds on the results of the previous COBRA project and aims to position COBRA+ as a major tool for decision-making support for deployment of C-ITS for National Road Authorities (NRAs). The COBRA+ tool builds on the strengths of the original COBRA tool. COBRA is a decision support tool in the form of a spreadsheet that enables NRAs to compare the costs and monetised benefits of C-ITS in various contexts to support investment decisions under different deployment scenarios. The new COBRA+ tool will be enhanced with new functionalities, greater geographic coverage and more flexibility and therefore updated to meet the requirements of users who, having made use of the COBRA tool, have a clear idea of what may be improved and enhanced.

The COBRA+ spreadsheet tool will be accompanied by a private website called the COBRA+ Monitor. This document sets out the specification for the COBRA+ Monitor which forms part of work package WP2 within the ANACONDA project. This document is structured as follows:

  • Section 2: Summary of requirements to be addressed
  • Section 3: Overview of COBRA+ Monitor
  • Section 4: Functionality of the website
  • Section 5: Website details
  • Section 6: Database details and upload procedures
  • Annex A: Preliminary requirements for COBRA+ Monitor
  • Annex B: Examples of graphs exported to COBRA+ Monitor.

Other related deliverables include the following:

  • D1.1: Results from the stakeholder requirement analysis (Mocanu et al. 2016)
  • D3.1: Specification of the COBRA+ spreadsheet (Ball et al. 2016).

2Summary of requirements to be addressed

2.1Requirements collection

The first stage in developing the user requirements for the COBRA+ Monitor involved presenting an initial proposal for the COBRA+ Monitor to the workshop for representatives of the NRAs held in November 2015, and capturing the feedback from the NRAs during the workshop. This feedback was then used to refine the initial proposal; the revised proposal was then presented to some of the PEB members individually during January and February and in the second workshop in May 2016. The full list of requirements collected from these meetings can be found in Annex A.

The following requirements were identified from these discussions.

Purpose:

  • The COBRA+ Monitor is intended to monitor:
  • plans for deployment of C-ITS
  • implementations of C-ITS
  • impacts of C-ITS
  • use of the COBRA+ tool.
  • It should promote information sharing between countries to enable them to learn from each other. This information-sharing is voluntary.

Countries covered and access to information:

  • Countries where the COBRA+ tool is being used – the sixcountries covered by the tool as a minimum.
  • Users of the COBRA+ Monitor are expected to mainly be users of the COBRA+ tool; however other CEDR road authorities may also wish to use it. Access will be granted to these five countries (and possibly the PEB) via a private website (possibly hosted on the new CEDR website).

Content of the COBRA+ Monitor should include:

  • Cost data used by the NRAs in the COBRA+ tool;
  • Bundles of services analysed by the NRAs in the COBRA+ tool to indicate deployment plans;
  • Outcomes of analyses carried out by NRAs in the COBRA+ tool to provide lessons learned;
  • Monitoring C-ITS implementations using common indicators;
  • Monitoring use of the COBRA+ tool.

Timing and flexibility:

  • The Monitor should be designed so that it is flexible enough to be refined during the remainder of the ANACONDA project (i.e. 2016) to take account of the results of current deployment projects; an iterative process is envisaged.

2.2Functionality / Questions the COBRA+ Monitor will attempt to answer

A further proposal for the COBRA+ Monitor was developed on the basis of the requirements summarised above. This outline proposal was presented to the CEDR ITS Group in February 2016 and was well received.

The various functionality requirements were synthesised into six proposed questions that the COBRA+ Monitor will help NRAs to answer:

  1. Who is using the COBRA+ tool, what scenarios are they conducting and what outputs are they obtaining?
  2. What user-defined inputs are being used in the COBRA+ tool, e.g. different cost data?
  3. What is the experience of users of the COBRA+ tool?
  4. What are the impacts of different C-ITS services and bundles, measured in terms of indicators within the COBRA+ tool?
  5. What are the impacts of different C-ITS services and bundles, measured in terms of indicators not within the COBRA+ tool, from other ad hoc data sources?
  6. What strategic plans are there for C-ITS in different countries?

3Overview of COBRA+ Monitor

3.1Data sources for each function

The COBRA+ Monitor will draw on a range of data; specifically it is proposed to use the following sources to enable for the six functions outlined above, respectively:

  1. Run-specific data (output from the COBRA+ tool)
  2. User-defined input data (output from the COBRA+ tool)
  3. User feedback on experiences (optional user survey)
  4. Impact assessment data (D3 from previous COBRA project and also updated data in COBRA+)
  5. Ad hoc impact data sources (shared by individual users via a web form, with email alerts)
  6. Survey of CEDR members (one-off online survey)

3.2Data flows

Figure 1sets out the anticipated operation of the COBRA+ Monitor system, with the six data sources labelled A-F.

Figure 1 – Overall system operation

The intention is that the various users of the COBRA+ tool will keep a local copy of the spreadsheet on their own machines. The default settings for these parallel versions will be identical, although there will be the opportunity to modify some parameters and include user-defined data.

Users will be able to use their version of the COBRA+ tool to share inputs and outputs with authorised users via a private webpage interface. This will be achieved with buttons within the tool so that the user can decide when they want to upload to the online database system. Some but not all of the data will be pushed from the tool into a central database, while the majority of the data is stored only within the COBRA+ tool.

The user webpages for each of the six functions and data sources are discussed in turn in Section 4. The database for four of the data sources (A, B, C and E) is discussed in Section 6.

4Functionality of the website

4.1[A] Scenario-specific data (output from the COBRA+ tool)

Function: Who is using the COBRA+ tool, what scenarios are they conducting and what outputs are they obtaining?

The user of the COBRA+ Tool will have an option to ‘Export scenarios to Monitor’. On doing so, the selected use case (bundles selected, communications platform, business model, etc.) for each of the two scenarios in the tool will be exported to the Monitor along with outputs (graphs, BCR, etc.). Thus, the export from the tool will create two new records (one for each scenario) in the database and on the Monitor web pages. Graphs contain information for both scenarios in the tool and will only be exported once and linked to the scenario records to which they relate. Samples showing the format of the graphs in the COBRA+ Tool which will be exported to the Monitor are included in Annex B.

The user will also be asked to provide an additional set of free text input fields, namely a brief description of the project being assessed: what, where, why and when. This will help users to interpret outputs from the Monitor which have been generated by other users and to understand the deployments which are being considered by those users.Outputs will be in the form of both tables and graphs; example outputs are given in Table 1.

Table 1 – Example table for scenario-specific data

Scenario / Inputs / Outputs
Tool version / Date of scenario run / Description of project (what, where, why, when) / Bundles selected / Platforms / Deployment level / Business model / Total benefits (million €) / Total costs (million €) / BCR
AT v1a / dd/mm/yy / … / 1 / Cellular / Medium / Public / €n.n / €n.n / n.n
AT v1a / dd/mm/yy / … / 1 / Wireless beacons / Medium / Public / €n.n / €n.n / n.n
NL v1a / dd/mm/yy / … / 3 / Cellular / Low / Public / €n.n / €n.n / n.n
DE v1a / dd/mm/yy / … / 2 / Hybrid / Medium / Public / €n.n / €n.n / n.n
DE v1a / dd/mm/yy / … / 1 / Hybrid / High / Private / €n.n / €n.n / n.n

4.2[B] User-defined input data (output from the COBRA+ tool)

Function: What user-defined inputs are being used in the COBRA+ tool, e.g. different cost data?

One of the main functions of the COBRA+ Monitor will be to share ‘key figure information’; for example, cost/km, cost/RSU, cost/ ITS station, etc.

The COBRA+ tool will be modified to allow the user to override default data where they have alternative values they wish to use. This will be implemented similar to the ‘Parameters’ worksheet in the current version, as shown inFigure 2; i.e. the value used in the tool is the purple column; by default this takes the value in the green column, unless a user-specified value is given in the yellow column.

Figure 2 – Example of user-defined input data within the COBRA+ spreadsheet

It is proposed that only instances where new values have been inputted in these yellow cells will be included in the online database and all other data will remain in the spreadsheets. This will meet the requirement of being able to see the range of cost data (for example) other countries are using in their version of the tool.The default values for each version of the tool will be available on the COBRA+ website for information, where user-defined inputs have not been entered.

Table 2 – Example table for user-defined data

Scenario run / User-defined cost input data
Tool version / Date of scenario run / Type of cost / Unit cost / Lifetime (years)
AT / dd/mm/yy / Wireless beacons / €10k / 10
NL / dd/mm/yy / Wireless beacons / €15k / 20
DE / dd/mm/yy / VMS / €200k / 30
DE / dd/mm/yy / VMS / €250k / 30

4.3[C] User feedback on experiences (optional user survey)

Function: What is the experience of users of the COBRA+ tool?

A link to an optional user survey will be included on the Monitor, whereby users can share their experiences of the tool. This user will need to log in to the password protected area, which will in turn identify the NRA of the user to the feedback system. The user will then be able to provide feedback on the webpage in one or more of the following categories:

  • Best practice for use of the COBRA+ tool – The primary purpose of the feedback function is to share best practice on the use of the COBRA+ spreadsheet: what worked; what didn’t work etc.
  • Suggestions for improvements – A secondary function is to provide suggestions for improvements on the COBRA+ tool and/or the COBRA+ Monitor webpages. These suggestions will be logged for consideration in future updates of the tool and Monitor[1].

Answers to the optional survey will be automatically uploaded to the Monitor when the user presses ‘submit’. If feedback is about the COBRA tool, then the user will be asked to specify which version of the COBRA tool they are using[2]. This will require the version of the tool to be displayed and easily accessible to the user. The date of submitted feedback will also be recorded.An example of the feedback form for the website is provided asFigure 3.