Integration of heterogeneous traffic and travel information through a combined internet and mobile communications

The feasibility study focused on the assessment of computing and telecommunications infrastructure needed for the implementation of a comprehensive and accurate traffic and travel information system that promotes urban sustainability and social inclusion. Using the developed infrastructure we have demonstrated the feasibility of the information granulation methodology in the context of traffic and travel data processing. An important practical objective of this research was the development of a prototype advanced travel information system (ATTAIN).
The theoretical and practical objectives of the feasibility study have been fully achieved and indeed exceeded, in that the original proof-of-concept ATTAIN system has been shown to be sufficiently robust and efficient that it could be released for use by general public in Nottingham in December 2001. Consequently the ATTAIN became the first system of its kind that has proven its ability to handle thousands of complex travel enquiries by general public in the context of a relatively large multi-route transportation system. The system has now been adopted by the Nottingham City Council as a standard wireless travel information system in Nottingham and will also provide real-time bus travel information.
Following the Government’s White Paper it is argued that better information about urban transport alternatives, as afforded by the ATTAIN system, will contribute to the reduction of the use of private vehicles (thus contributing to cleaner air and enhancing the sustainability of city centres) as well as the overall increase of mobility and accessibility of people to services (social inclusion).
The research also contributed to the improvement of understanding of the role and potential of granular computing as a means of deriving and manipulating information abstractions. The granular computing approach represents a novel and very promising development in computer science.

This EPSRC funded project led to a successful technology transfer

Publications

• Bargiela A., Hartley J., Peytchev E., Integration of heterogeneous traffic and travel information through a combined internet and mobile communications, EPSRC GR/R 32468, Final report.
• Bargiela A., Peytchev E., Intelligent transportation systems - towards integrated framework for traffic/transport telematics applications, IEEE Vehicular Technology Society conference, VTC'01, Atlantic City, Oct. 2001, pp.785-789
• Hartley J., Bargiela A., Decision Support for Planning Multi-Modal Urban Travel, Proc. European Simulation Symposium, ESS'01, Marseilles, Oct. 2001, pp.387-391
• Kosonen I., Bargiela A., Real-time environment for micro-simulation of urban traffic, Proc. European Simulation Symposium, ESS'01, Marseilles, Oct. 2001, pp.382-386
• Bargiela, A., Interval and ellipsoidal uncertainty models, Granular Computing, Physica Verlag, 2001, pp.23-57
• Bargiela, A., Pedrycz, W., Recursive information granulation: Aggregation and Interpretation issues, IEEE Transactions Systems Man and Cybernetics, Vol. 32, 3, 2002, pp.358-371
• Pedrycz, W., Bargiela, A., Granular Clustering: A granular signature of data, IEEE Transactions Systems Man and Cybernetics, vol.32, 2, 2002, pp. 212-224
• Bargiela, A., Pedrycz, W., A model of granular data: a design problem with the Tchebyschev FCM, Journal of Soft Computing, 2001, vol. 6, pp.301-318
• Bargiela, A., Pedrycz, W., From numbers to information granules: A study of unsupervised learning and feature analysis, In: H. Bunke, A. Kandel (eds.) Hybrid Methods in Pattern Recognition, World Scientific, 2002, pp. 1-35
• Pedrycz W, Bargiela A, Fuzzy fractal dimensions and fuzzy modeling, Information Sciences , 153, 2003, 199-216, doi:10.1016/S0020-0255(03)00075-6
• Cichocki A., Bargiela A., Neural Networks for Solving Linear Inequality Systems, Parallel Computing , Vol.22, No.11, Jan. 1997, pp.1455-1475, doi: 10.1016/S0167-8191(96)00065-8
• Bargiela A., Irving M., Sterling M., Observability determination in power system state estimation, IEEE. Transactions on Power Systems , PWR, 1, 2, May 1986, pp. 108-112, doi: 10.1109/TPWRS.1986.4334914