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Studies in Systems, Decision and Control 32

Aleksander Sładkowski
Wiesław Pamuła Editors

Intelligent
Transportation
Systems –
Problems and
Perspectives
Studies in Systems, Decision and Control

Volume 32

Series editor
Janusz Kacprzyk, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
e-mail: kacprzyk@ibspan.waw.pl
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Aleksander Sładkowski · Wiesław Pamuła
Editors

Intelligent Transportation
Systems – Problems
and Perspectives

13
Editors
Aleksander Sładkowski Wiesław Pamuła
Department of Logistics and Mechanical Department of Transport Systems
Handling and Traffic Engineering
Silesian University of Technology Silesian University of Technology
Katowice Katowice
Poland Poland

ISSN 2198-4182 ISSN 2198-4190 (electronic)


Studies in Systems, Decision and Control
ISBN 978-3-319-19149-2 ISBN 978-3-319-19150-8 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-19150-8

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015940971

Springer Cham Heidelberg New York Dordrecht London


© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part
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herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made.

Printed on acid-free paper

Springer International Publishing AG Switzerland is part of Springer Science+Business Media


(www.springer.com)
Preface

The term “intelligent transport system” is used to name the integration of control,
information and communication technologies with transport infrastructure. ITS
covers all modes of transport and takes into account the dynamic interaction of all
constituents of the transport system. A transport system can be considered effec-
tive if it is capable of linking all sources of data in the system to produce valuable
information. This information is the basis for control and management decisions
which are made by transport users and operators. The potential of Intelligent
Transport Systems lies in their wide variety of applications in different modes of
transport.
The editors aim was to present the discussion of problems encountered in the
deployment of ITS. This discussion places emphasis on the early tasks of design-
ing and proofing the concept of integration of technologies in ITS. The book com-
prises two parts.
The first part concentrates on the design problems of urban ITS. It is divided
into five chapters.
The first chapter reviews the challenges of incorporating ICT for establishing
a smart transport system as an autonomic entity and to ensure a high reliability of
functioning. Reliability is essential since most other services of the living environ-
ment smart city, rely on transport systems. The chapter gives an overview on the
state of research based on current literature and recent publications of the authors.
The next chapter emphasizes the problems of designing the ITS for transition to
“green” transport. The definition of the environmentally friendly transport is out-
lined using EU and UN transport policy documents. The term management system
is stressed as vital for reaching the goals of such transport. Different aspects of
managing the data flow within the system are discussed. Especially the interface
between vehicles and infrastructure as the source of data for elaboration of control
decisions is presented.
Żochowska and Karoń in Chap. “ITS Services Packages as a Tool for
Managing Traffic Congestion in Cities” discuss strategies for managing conges-
tion using packages of ITS services. Congestion management is a vital problem in
urban transport systems greatly contributing to the efficiency of ITS. The authors

v
vi Preface

present their concept of combining services to enhance the utilization of collected


data in the transport system. This requires a close cooperation and coordination
between planners, designers and traffic engineers. The chapter also presents the
concept of an integrated approach to this issue in the context of the theory of traf-
fic flow.
The following chapter gives a detailed account of using artificial intelligence
methods for determining flow volumes in traffic networks. The aim of the study
was to compare the short-term forecasting models based on Bayesian networks
(BN) and artificial neural networks (NN), which can be used in traffic control sys-
tems especially incorporated into modules of Intelligent Transport Systems.
In the last chapter of the first part the problem of transport line capacities is
reviewed. Capacity dimensioning is an important element of resource man-
agement in ITS. Mathematical model for optimal capacity sizing of N different
transport types (capacity types) is explained, minimizing the total expansion cost.
Instead of nonlinear polynomial convex optimization technique, that could be very
exhausted, the network optimization method is applied. Using this approach an
efficient algorithm for three different capacity types is developed and outlined.
The second part of the book consists of three chapters featuring case studies
representative for the different modes of transport. These are freight transport, rail
transport and aerospace transport encompassing also space stations.
Freight transport ensures the supply of materials for production and the dis-
patch of ready products to customers. Just-in-time supply chains, door-to-door
transport impose challenges on the design of an efficient transport systems. The
introduction of ICT ease the problems and also bring new issues to resolve during
deployment. Authors classify the risks of development and deployment of trans-
port systems serving industrial enterprises.
Młyńczak et al. in the following chapter introduce the components of
the European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS). This system is one
of the important components ensuring interoperability of the European rail s­ ystem.
The vital components, their features and functions are discussed. The overall
structure of the ERTMS is illustrated.
The last chapter elaborates on the subject of deployment of ITS services in aer-
ospace engineering. Intelligent control must be able to process flying object data
under rapidly varying operating conditions, to form conclusions, make decisions,
and manage the objects flight. This requires a rigorous interaction between control
systems and the transport infrastructure, which can be provided by the integration
of ICT. The outline of this integrated system is presented in the chapter.
The content of the book presents the problems of deployment of ITS from a
slightly infected perspective. This is the influence of long term State imposed
transport policies, which were resistant to the introduction of new technologies
for transport control and management. The authors of the book work in Croatia,
Germany, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Ukraine, United Kingdom and Poland.
This multi national perspective constitutes a valuable incentive for elaborating
common solutions for integration of ICT in transport.
Preface vii

The book provides ideas for deployment which may be developed by scientists
and engineers engaged in the design of Intelligent Transport Systems. It can also
be used in the training of specialists, students and post-graduate students in univer-
sities and transport high schools.

Aleksander Sładkowski
Wiesław Pamuła
Contents

Part I Deployment of ITS in Road Transport

Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities,


Personalized Medicine, Participation and Industry Grid/Industry 4.0. . . . . 3
Jörn Schlingensiepen, Florin Nemtanu, Rashid Mehmood
and Lee McCluskey

Increase of City Transport System Management Efficiency


with Application of Modeling Methods and Data Intellectual Analysis. . . 37
Irina Makarova, Rifat Khabibullin, Eduard Belyaev and Vadim Mavrin

ITS Services Packages as a Tool for Managing Traffic Congestion


in Cities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Renata Żochowska and Grzegorz Karoń

The Traffic Flow Prediction Using Bayesian and Neural Networks. . . . . . 105
Teresa Pamuła and Aleksander Król

Dimensioning of Multiple Capacity Transport Line with Mutual


Traffic Correlation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
Srećko Krile

Part II ITS Case Studies

Design of an ITS for Industrial Enterprises. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161


Alexandr Rakhmangulov, Aleksander Sładkowski and Nikita Osintsev

European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217


Jakub Młyńczak, Andrzej Toruń and Lucyna Bester

Intelligent Transport Systems in Aerospace Engineering. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243


Anatoliy Kulik and Konstantin Dergachev
ix
Part I
Deployment of ITS in Road Transport
Autonomic Transport Management
Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities,
Personalized Medicine, Participation and
Industry Grid/Industry 4.0

Jörn Schlingensiepen, Florin Nemtanu, Rashid Mehmood


and Lee McCluskey

Abstract Today’s societies are facing great challenges in transforming living


environments in a way better serving people’s demands of the future. A key point
in this transformation is reinventing cities as smart cities, where the core services
are integrated in a way that ensures a high quality of life while minimizing the
usage of resources [Smart cities in Europe. Serie Research Memoranda 0048,
VU University Amsterdam, Faculty of Economics, Business Administration and
Econometrics 1]. Setting up smart cities resp. transforming cities to smart cities
includes the development of smart transport systems as a main service all other
services rely on. Thinking about current mega trends like Individualization of
Products (Mass Customization) in so called Industry grid also known as Industry
4.0 [Umsetzungsempfehlungen für das Zukunftsprojekt Industrie 4.0 2] (Industrie
4.0 describes the industry in the 4th industrial revolution to customized mass
production after mechanization, mass production, digitalization [Map ‘n’ tag.
Thinking highways 3]), Personalized Medicine or the need of better support for
disabled and older people in an aging society, the interconnection of involved bod-
ies is a premise. In virtual world this means integration of data networks and ICTs
in the physical world this means establishing individual and personalized transport

J. Schlingensiepen (*)
TH Ingolstadt, Ingolstadt, Germany
e-mail: joern@schlingensiepen.com
URL: http://www.thi.de
F. Nemtanu
“POLITEHNICA” University of Bucharest, Bucharest, Romania
e-mail: fnemtanu@yahoo.com
R. Mehmood
King Khalid University, Abha, Saudi Arabia
e-mail: R.Mehmood@gmail.com
L. McCluskey
University of Huddersfield, Huddersfield, UK
e-mail: t.l.mccluskey@hud.ac.uk

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016 3


A. Sładkowski and W. Pamuła (eds.), Intelligent Transportation
Systems – Problems and Perspectives, Studies in Systems,
Decision and Control 32, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-19150-8_1
4 J. Schlingensiepen et al.

services that cover individual mobility and individual distribution of goods.


To ensure the best utilization of infrastructure while having less employable peo-
ple in an aging society a high grade of automation and information integration
is needed. We call this a smart transport system as the next step in development
of today’s intelligent transport systems (ITS) and propose establishing this ITS
of the future as an autonomic system to meet all the different requirements and
ensure a high reliability of the overall system. Reliability is essential since most
other services of the living environment smart city, will rely on transport systems.
This chapter gives an overview on state of research based on current literature and
recent publications of the authors (see references) and focus on the ICT system
needed to manage transportation the autonomic transport management system.

Keywords Personalized mobility · Logistics for industry grid/industry 4.0 ·


Smart cities · Individual/personalized transport · Personalized medicine ·
Individual products/mass customization · Networked information systems ·
Sensors as a service autonomic computing · Participation of disabled

1 Current State—Need for Action

Mobility of people and goods is a key challenge for the future. Transport is one of
the world’s largest industrial sectors, but today’s road transport system are already
fully loaded. The cost of congestion alone estimated at Euro 100 billion per year
in the EU [4].
Following the Communication from the Commission Europe 2020—A strat-
egy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth [5] European Union has set three
priorities:
• Smart growth: developing an economy based on knowledge and innovation.
• Sustainable growth: promoting a more resource efficient, greener and more
competitive economy.
• Inclusive growth: fostering a high-employment economy delivering social and
territorial cohesion.
Following this agenda causes some socio-technological issues. Smartness will
cause a higher grade of automation like autonomous systems and the question of
liability for these systems is not clear (and there is not much public discussion
about this)—today the UN-Convention on Road Traffic Vienna [6] permits autono-
mous vehicles in general—and of course the question of privacy in a world all sys-
tems serving us are highly integrated has to be discussed.
Beside this legal and sociological issues we need to think about new ways in
providing infrastructure, not only in case of transportation, but since this is the
main underlying service it is the enabler for all other services or function and
therefore we focus on how transport systems can help optimizing the overall
system.
Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities ... 5

Since mass transportation does not fulfill the demands in personal transport and
individual good distribution future transport systems will be multi-modal, com-
bined transport systems including cars, vans and trucks as well as buses, trains and
other public transport vehicles.
Today’s systems of road traffic flow are affected by the outcome of individual
driving decisions, often assisted by personalized navigation and information-
providing devices. Even in future actors in those systems will make their own
local decisions by human passengers or local decision engines. Therefore vehicles
and passengers need to be integrated in those systems by mobile devices/control-
lers (so called on board units) and new requirements on vehicles and traffic man-
agement systems are coming up. The spreading of incorporated units doing local
decisions causes using distributed software system architecture and the main pur-
pose for this distributed system resp. its backbone is providing current data to the
local decision engines in a fast and reliable way.
Autonomic Transport Management Systems (ATMS) face those problems and
provide a new approach for establishing transportation networks.

2 Expectations on Smart Transport

According to [7] the core function of a Smart City is an open, inter-operable and
scalable platform that provides intelligent infrastructure functionality as a service
and allows for optimal resource management. Figure 1 shows the main aspects of
open inter-operable infrastructure for a smart city.

Fig. 1  Main aspects of open


interoperable infrastructure
for a smart city (source [7])
6 J. Schlingensiepen et al.

The concept of Smart Cities needs a flexible partnership between public and pri-
vate sectors as well as diverse industries such as telecommunication, energy pro-
viders, manufacturers and suppliers to ensure improvements in mobility, energy
consumption, governance and social cohesion in European cities [8, 9]. At present
the modal split of transport in Europe is dominated by passenger cars (73.4 % com-
pared to just 1.4 % for tram and metro combined). According to the World Health
Organisation, some 40 million people in the 115 largest cities in the EU are exposed
to air exceeding WHO air quality guideline values for at least one pollutant [10].
Expectation on Smart Transport is to reduce this pollution and the related
health risks in order to improve quality of life in urban areas while providing a
better service to the inhabitants by fulfilling personal demands in an easy to use,
flexible and cost-efficient way.

3 Requirements on Smart Transport

The user experience while using smart city service has to be designed in a way
user gets a better service respective his needs are fulfilled with less effort/time
consumption and a minimum of interaction needed. Industrial users will require a
high reliability and adherence to schedules to integrate general transport system in
their supply chain and production lines.
This leads to the main issues to be addressed:
• Resources need to be allocated predictively
• Allocation of resource has to follow the overall benefit
• Peaks in needs have to be eliminated
• To ensure reliability the overall system need to be fault tolerant, it has to work
even if there are dysfunctions in some areas.
Beside this general requirements there are requirements cause by changes in dif-
ferent areas show up in the following subsections.

3.1 Emerging Requirements Caused by Changes in Industry

Beside this needs for more efficient use of energy, land and other resources in exe-
cution of transport the fundamental changes in industry related to the concept of
industry 4.0 [11] and the internet of things cause new requirements on transport.
Different initiatives like Smart Manufacturing Leadership Coalition [12] or
Zukunftsprojekt Industrie 4.0 [13] propagate different but similar scenarios for
future development in production, the common characteristic are the strong cus-
tomization of products under the conditions of high flexibilized (mass-) pro-
duction. This means products are tailored for specific costumers. As a result
traditional distribution and supply chains using stock house storing standard
Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities ... 7

products or just-in-time production with long order time are obsolete. A popular
example from Germany for this is myMüsli [14] an online shop to order custom-
ized cereals fitting personal liking. Their product is a personalized granola that is
mixed to the order. There is no way to use classic stock and of course the costumer
expect his granola for the breakfast next morning. If we take this sample as a first
step on a way to an industry providing built to order products only like stated in
[2, 15, 16] we can assume a high rate of growth in the field of personalized just in
time transport in the next few years.

3.2 Emerging Requirements Caused by Personalization


of Medic Care

Beside industrial products the so called personalized medicine is going to provide


personalized drugs or health programs based on person’s genome or personalized
care taker applications [17, 18]. This will cause a new class of time critical trans-
port goods with undefined transport targets, since they are not needed at a per-
son’s home address but a person’s whereabouts. Another aspect of personalized
medicine is taking tele-medicine to the next level. The miniaturization of machines
for diagnosis and the so called health monitoring gadgets (e.g. Apple Health [19],
Microsoft HealthVault [20], Samsung S Health [21]) will allow earlier detection
of health problems and will cause new kind of emergency protocols that has to be
considered while planning a future transportation system.

3.3 Emerging Requirements Caused by Changes


in Users Demands

Beside the transportation of good the personalized travel planning and assistance
dictates additional requirements to the system. Today’s public transport is not
accepted because of a lack of comfort, reliability and time efficiency. Following
[3, 22] this can be done by implementing a Adaptive Travel Planning and
Monitoring system that provides travel planning and support during the travel by
giving advice based on the current traffic situation. Today TrafficCheck.at (a pro-
ject funded by the Austrian ministry responsible for traffic, innovation and tech-
nology) [23] has implemented some of this aspects by using crowd intelligence.
Inhabitants can access this data via a central web portal using their smartphones
and post back their rating to this central data base.
Future smart transport systems shall gain this data directly from the field like
it is done in project mobile [24] (funded by the German Ministry of Education
and research). This project focus on the problem that today’s public transport is
not easy to use by people having mental problems, are disabled or infirm. Traffic
planning today is powered by online time tables calculating the optimal way to use
public transport in terms of time and costs.
8 J. Schlingensiepen et al.

3.4 Emerging Requirements Caused by Ensuring Better


Participation of Disabled and Elderly

Focusing on optimizing only one aspect of traveling, like described in the section
above, is not suitable for a group of travelers having constraints in using vehicles,
vehicle types or particular stations for health reasons. Since most of those people
are not able to drive a car on their own, making public transport available opens
them a way to get more personal independence. The political agenda is very clear,
the UN-Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities [25] and its national
implementations clearly states the goal allowing this persons to take part in social
and cultural life and in the sample described in Sect. 6 shows, and this means
implementing planning algorithms that are personalized.

3.5 Requirement Sustainability

As already stated in [26] the sustainability of transport systems has four main
issues to be addressed: the (i) energy efficiency (for the same transport activity a
smaller quantity of energy should be consumed), (ii) saving time (the time allo-
cated for transport activity has to be minimized), (iii) saving money (the cost of
transport is reflected in the price of goods not in the quality of them) and (iv) envi-
ronmental aspects (the transport should protect the environment not to destruct it).
The fourth priority area of European ITS Directive [27] is focused on linking the
vehicles with the infrastructure based, especially, on open in-vehicle platform as
well as cooperative systems. That means integration between the vehicles and the
infrastructure. Urban ITS is an important domain of ITS applications and ITS and
Autonomic Road Transport Systems (ARTS [28]) could be tools of solving traf-
fic and mobility problems in cities (Urban ITS Expert Group has already elabo-
rated a set of guidelines oriented on ITS for urban areas—i.e. Guidelines for ITS
Deployment in Urban Areas—Multimodal Information [29]).
One of the keys to increase energy efficiency is avoiding traffic jam or other
interferences of traffic flow. These also will decrease the amount of CO2 emitted
by traffic as these numbers show: On the one hand in 2007 the CO2 emissions
caused by traffic jams (not including inappropriate periods of traffic lights or
additional break usage on heavy loaded roads) in Germany only was 714,000 to
(288 million liters of fuel) or approximately 7 % of the CO2 emissions by passen-
ger cars. On the other hand the recent study Understanding Road Usage Patterns
in Urban Areas [30] shows that, even during peak hours 98 % of the road seg-
ments are underutilized. Therefore, the approach to better utilize existing infra-
structure through better planning of utilization appears promising.
Beside better usage of infrastructure the EU FP7 funded project SARTRE (Safe
Road Trains for the Environment) [31] shows up another approach to minimize
fuel usage. The project aims to encourage a step change in personal transport
Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities ... 9

usage by developing of road trains called platoons. Platoon members shall benefit
from a better aerodynamic of the overall road train [32]. The planned systems will
facilitating the safe adoption of road trains on unmodified public highways with
interaction with other traffic. A scheme will be developed whereby a lead vehicle
with a professional driver will take responsibility for a platoon. Following vehicles
will enter a semi-autonomous control mode that allows the driver of the following
vehicle to do other things that would normally be prohibited for reasons of safety;
for example, operate a phone, reading a book or watching a movie. As shown in
[33] this approach needs a very reliable vehicle to infrastructure communication
that will be provided by the corporative ICT described in Sect. 7.4 and a flexible
scalable system of sensor integration that will be provided by the overlay network
described in Sects. 7.1–7.3.

3.6 Influencing Traffic Requirements

To allow an effective traffic management the current traffic situation and operating
grade has to be captured to allow predictions on future situations to hedge deci-
sions made by users, operators and decision engines.
All described aspects a Smart Transport Systems requires a good understand-
ing about the mechanisms traffic of independent and controlled vehicles is organ-
ized and can be influenced by managed infrastructure and service elements like
traffic lights, special trains etc. A pre-condition for Smart Transport System is an
automated decision system to control these influencing element. This means the
system has to incorporate knowledge gained from traffic simulations done during
set up or changing infrastructure or while optimizing the current system as well as
knowledge gained from real-time in-line simulation that is fed with current state of
the overall system and allows prediction on the near time behavior in terms of road
load, congestions, speed and resulting travel time. An overview on current state in
these different kind of simulations can be found in Sect. 6.
The main issue while implementing those kind of systems is providing a good
basis for decision to the decision engines and in-line simulations. The best basis
for decisions is knowing about the current state of the overall system. That is why
the data acquisition and the networks transporting the information about the cur-
rent situation in the field are an important aspect of ATMS.
Figure 7 shows that decisions in the vehicle are made by the on board support
decision engine or the driver. Today and in the near future for legal reasons and
reasons of user acceptance all decisions at all levels will be made by the driver,
so the information of ITS are incorporated in the decision-making process as
suggestions, provided to the driver by a mobile device called adviser. Studies of
University of Twente have shown that the drivers’ trust in the advice of the system
is an essential requirement and this confidence is often absent [34]. Drivers make
decisions (e.g. choosing lanes, speed adjustment) on the basis of personal experi-
ences. Therefore the effect of not trusting the advice is boosted, because in road
10 J. Schlingensiepen et al.

traffic systems the results of decisions that are inauspicious for the overall system
are not hurting the decision maker but other road users.
Figure 8 derived from [26] shows some examples for actions respectively deci-
sions made at the different levels, details on this can be found in [26].

4 Approach for ATMS

At this point it is obvious that reliability of data is essential and the most impor-
tant requirement to the ATMS. Therefore the COST ARTS group propose usage
of the principles of autonomic systems. Establishing an autonomic system gives
some great advantages in increasing reliability of the overall systems. Autonomic
Computing was launched by IBM [35] and can be viewed as a challenge to embed
desirable self-managing intelligent properties into large systems to cope with
the problems of their inherent complexity. Autonomic systems will help solving
today’s core problems in engineering new transport systems: their costly con-
figuration and maintenance, high operating complexity, suboptimal operation,
and the problem of embedding and maintaining safety and environmental condi-
tions within the operational parameters of the controlling system. Autonomic
Computing integrates ideas from several areas of AI including automated reason-
ing, machine learning and automated planning, and implementations often draw
on distributed AI technologies such as intelligent agents.
Before proposing autonomic systems as a holistic approach there was already
research into the many challenges of implementing autonomic behavior in trans-
portation systems, and what has been done has been carried out in a range of
fragmented research areas. Some pilot studies concerning road transport systems
technologies use agent-based technology [36–39]. Utilizing a more centralized
notion of self-maintenance, theory refinement algorithms for automatically evolv-
ing a requirements model of air traffic control criteria was developed in work
sponsored by the UK NATS [40]. Concentrating on self-organization is the focus
of Organic Computing, a large cooperative research effort sponsored by the DFG
[41]. Its goals are the development and control of emergent and self-organizing
technical systems. In the area of Organic Computing several projects have investi-
gated the feasibility of adaptive, intelligent traffic light controllers and their ability
to self-organise, e.g. to form progressive signal systems [42]. Systems with auto-
nomic capabilities will help alleviate many of today’s problems associated with
life cycle management of complex systems. Autonomic systems embody self-
assessment and self-management abilities that enable the system to assess its own
state, then adapt or heal itself in response to that assessment.
The interface between system and owner is set at a very high level: the owner
sets out goals, policies or service levels that the system must follow, and the sys-
tem translates these into its system functions resulting in a change of behavior.
IBM defines four areas of autonomic functions: (i) self-configuration through
automatic configuration of components; (ii) self-healing through automatic
Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities ... 11

discovery, and correction of faults; (iii) self-optimization through automatic moni-


toring and control of resources to ensure the optimal functioning with respect to
the defined requirements; and (iv) self-protection through proactive identification
and protection from arbitrary attacks. We define autonomification as the process
of transforming an entity (a service, system or infrastructure) into an autonomic
entity such that the process infuses autonomic properties into an entity causing the
entity to become an autonomic entity. In terms of an ITS this influence two aspects
of the system: Components design and architecture of the system. Components
needs to be implemented in a way that includes not only posting and consuming
data but also self-assessing and giving additional data about own state and the
trustability of measured data which can be combined with networks of trust and
service levels. Today’s systems process only measured data with high trustability,
in case of harvesting several data from many different measuring entities like it is
done in an ATMS processing of unsure data will lead to a more valid picture of
current system state. On top of current network infrastructure a p2p-Layer (over-
lay network) shall be established. Where users can join the network using their
personal device and infrastructure elements are plugged in as service providers
(see Sect. 7.3). The architecture of an autonomic ITS has to respect the fact, that
the different component in the system are owned, run and configured by differ-
ent stakeholders with different interest. To fulfill the described requirements we
need to define two main aspects of the overall system. 1st is the architecture of the
overlay network that is used to gather all information to provide a valid picture
of the field (in our case the traffic situation in a given area). This overlay network
provides the base of the ATS. 2nd is the overall architecture of the back-end that is
used to receive, store, process and provide incorporated information resp. data.
The described approach calls for integration of existing technologies and
research approaches, the following sections gives an overview on promising
approaches that needs to be incorporated into an ATMS.

5 Overlay Descriptions for Personalized Travel Planning

The project mobile funded by The German Federal Ministry of economy and
energy1 in order to reach the goals of the UN-Convention on the Rights of Persons
with Disabilities [44] aims to develop a system to support disabled and elderly
people while using public transports. Within this project and approach for person-
alized travel planning was developed and introduced to public in [22]. This kind of
planning systems seems to be interesting being included in an ATMS. Details
about the project at all can be found in [45].

1Project mobile is part of initiative from door to door [43] funded by BMWi, as a mobility initia-

tive for the public passenger transport of the future. Within this initiative, a set of projects were
started that address different aspects of public transportation.
12 J. Schlingensiepen et al.

Today’s public transport is not easy to use by people having mental problems or
are disabled. Traffic planning today is powered by online time tables calculating the
optimal way to use public transport in terms of time and costs. Therefore usually a
graph or petri net representing the public transport network is set up and algorithms
taken from graph theory or operations research are used to find optimal routes [46].
An implicit assumption in this is that optimal has the same meaning for all stake-
holders, e.g. minimizing travel time. So the travel planer can use a common graph
for all requests and generate look up tables to guaranty short answering times.
This is not suitable for a group of travelers having constraints in using vehi-
cles, vehicle types or particular stations for health reasons. Since most of those
people are not able to drive a car on their own, making public transport availa-
ble opens them a way to get more personal independence. Therefore in mobile a
system was developed that allows undertaking personal constraints in route plan-
ning. Therefore a system that describes vehicles, stations and personal attributes
of mentioned travelers was developed. This allows generation of a second graph
representing the public transport network not in dimension of time and costs but
in preferences and dislike of a given traveler. This second graph is overlayed the
standard graph to get a personalized graph that allows finding a suitable route
respecting the constraints of the user.

5.1 Investigation Area

About 28 million people use the public passenger transport in Germany daily, this
shows the good acceptance of a well meshed traffic system. The Verkehrsverbund
Rhein-Ruhr (abbreviated VRR) is the public transport association covering the
area of the Rhine-Ruhr conurbation in Germany. It was founded on 1 January
1980, and is Europe’s largest body of such kind, covering an area of some
5,000 km2 with more than seven million inhabitants, spanning as far as Dorsten in
the north, Dortmund in the east, Langenfeld in the south, and Mönchengladbach
and the Dutch border in the west [47]. Since this infrastructure is already estab-
lished this area is a good place to justify investment to open this service for people
which are not able to use it today. And the dense mesh provided by the compa-
nies running VRR is the perfect area to introduce a system that provide support for
disabled people with means that support them during traveling in public transport
systems [45, 48]. Especially, the local transportation system is addressed where a
mixture of different transportation means (e.g., bus or tram) are used. As a result,
the major problem is to support people while changing vehicles.
During the first assessments within the project, it came out that a major prob-
lem of the people is lack of information and a proper handling of uncertainty. As a
result, a major goal of the project is to…
• …provide the traveler with routes that meet their individual capabilities, restric-
tions, needs and preferences; this covers a wide range of issues like avoiding over-
crowded buses, inability to uses stairs, inabilities to use complex bus stations etc.
Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities ... 13

• …provide travelers with timely information about their current schedule (what
happens next, when to leave the vehicle, how much time is left until the con-
necting vehicle arrives, etc.)
• …help people locating themselves, especially with respect to bus stations or
other locations important for the current journey; this especially addresses iden-
tifying the right bus station on the appropriate side of the street or within a com-
plex bus terminal station
• …identifying transportation vehicles in order to decide whether or not to enter a
vehicle; this must be done in a way so that the traveler is sure that he enters the
right bus or tram
• …inform people when to prepare and when to leave vehicle during a trip
• …identifying stressful situations to the traveler and calming down people when
needed
This findings lead to three problems to solve: (i) The actual advice generated by
the system must be customizable to match the individual needs of the traveler and
(ii) presentation and interaction with the system must be adaptable to user’s capa-
bilities and to ensure this (iii) system needs to know very precisely where the user
is. All problems are addressed in project mobile e.g. by indoor-navigation [49, 50]
or personalized user interface design [51, 52]. For the functions that needs to be
incorporated into an ATMS we focus on how the back-end system can generate
personalized advices based on the current traffic situation and road maps.
The people within the target groups that are addressed in this projects differ sig-
nificantly with respect to their capabilities and needs. In general two major groups
are addressed: people with mental problems and people with physical disabilities.
The group of mentally restricted people suffer from a wide range of problems
that start from intellectual restrictions like illiteracy or in-capabilities of dealing
with concepts of time. These people need a strong support and a user interface
that especially addresses their deficiencies. For example, speech output or sim-
ple graphical symbols must be used if the traveler cannot read. On the other hand,
there are also people that e.g. are capable of using a smart-phone without any
problems but may be easily distracted. As a result, special means are needed to
draw their attention towards the current travel related issues.
For the group of physically disabled people, we especially address tempo-
rary restrictions (e.g., caused by the surgery). For these cases, people that usually
travel by their own car are temporarily forced to use public transport and often
suffer from a lack of knowledge and training how to use public transportation. As
a result, information about where to reach the next bus station, which vehicle to
enter and when to leave are the major aspects that are to be addressed.

5.2 Personas and Characteristics

To allow describing the characteristics of infrastructure and users an attribution


system was developed. There are five kind of entities that can be described by
attributes, while the attribute value may vary depending on the time of day, the day
of week or holidays:
14 J. Schlingensiepen et al.

1. Users have different needs and preferences that can be expressed by attributes
assigned to this user. To allow dealing with different type of users so called per-
sonas where defined. This method taken from User Experience Design allows
description of typical users an their behaviors in order to have a better under-
standing of the needs during development without referring to real persons [54].
Users have Tolerance settings describing the user’s tolerance to route changes,
idle time along the trip, crowded areas, noisy surroundings and visual contact
with other people. Movement settings describing the user’s motoric capabilities
which includes the walking speed and endurance as well as the ability to take
steps, use escalators or elevators. This includes also the demand of the user to
get a free seat or special places at stations or within transport vehicles.
2. Vehicle types have different attributes describing the way a special type of
vehicle can be used, e.g. a low floor bus can be used by wheelchair users, while
a common bus cannot be used. So the most important attribute of vehicle type
are height, width, steps and existence of special places.
3. Vehicles have different attributes describing the way a particular vehicle can
be used. Some buses may have identification support, while other don’t. In this
case users that are reliant on vehicle identification support are not able to use
this vehicle.
4. Stations are the nodes in the network having different attributes describing the
way they can be used for start and end of travel or during changing vehicles.
In terms of personalized route planning the most important attributes describ-
ing a station are steps, daylight, security and load. The existence of steps with-
out an elevator makes a station unusable for wheel chair users. Daylight and
load has to be added to cover needs of users having mental problems and may
panic in crowded stations or vehicles or on using an under-bridge. Load attrib-
ute dependents on time of use. Since most of the users in our target group are
defenseless the attribute security became very important during travel planning.
5. Links between the nodes are the traffic lines used by the user during traveling
a calculated route. In terms of personalized route planning the most important
attributes describing a link are the load, security, costs and speed. While costs
and speed are usual attributes in route planning, the load and security has to be
added to meet user’s requirements (see above).
To allow easier management of attribution of entities a class system was developed
it consists of:
• Persona describing a stereotypical user which is similar to real passengers [54]
and are constructed with different behaviors, profiles and objectives. A per-
sona does not correspond to a real person, but represents a typical user, which
is composed of different features and behavior. Inside the system every user is
composed of the different behaviors of persona, where specific needs overwrite
the attributes of the assigned persona.
• Infrastructure Elements are all elements in the public transport system, like
Vehicles, Vehicle Type, Lines, Links, and Stations etc. Those element provide
facility for given needs, therefore the Infrastructure Elements are designed as a
complement to Persona.
Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities ... 15

• Classes of Persona or Infrastructure Elements incorporate entities with similar


attributes, this allows easy management of descriptions by implementing classes
of stations (main station, hub, terminal, etc.) or disease patterns.

5.3 Dimensions and Penalty

To allow comparison of routes and find a suitable route for a user a penalty system
was developed to overlay the speed and cost optimal routes with the needs of the
user. To calculate this weighted route efforts each infrastructure element used in
a route is loaded by a user specific penalty summand (e.g. stations) or a user spe-
cific penalty factor (e.g. links, vehicle use). In reality not all attributes for stations
and users are available since some of them may not be suitable or not gathered.
Therefore a system that allows flexible calculation based on the available informa-
tion was developed. All attributes are normalized and ordered in dimensions. E.g.
the need of a user for an elevator instead of stairs and the existence of an elevator
in a station are the same dimension. Inside a dimension the attribute values are
normalized, like shown in Table 1.
The system to calculate this weights works in four steps:
• Determine the specific descriptions of user’s needs from Persona, Class of
Persona and personal settings.
• Determine the specific description of possibly used infrastructure element.
• Calculate a penalty factor on usage of each possibly used infrastructure element.
• Calculate the route efforts while using weighted speed and costs.
Determination of the specific attributes and values for a user is done by col-
lecting values for each dimension from the class system, by the following algo-
rithm: Starting with personal record, if dimension attribute is set take it, go to next
dimension, if attribute is not set go on with the record of the class this record is
based on. Reaching the root class without getting an attribute means this dimen-
sion is not described for this user. Figure 2 show determination of attribute values.

Table 1  Normalized values Value User Infrastructure element


for attributes
−8 Try to avoid Very hard to use
−4 Strong do not like Hard to use
−2 Do not like Inconvenient to use
0 No special need No special service
2 Nice to have Provide service
4 Recommended Special facilities to
provide
8 Strongly recommended Perfect
1000 Hard need −/−
16 J. Schlingensiepen et al.

Cu1 Cu2 Cu3 ... Cud Cid ... Ci3 Ci2 Ci1

C User Class
e.g. Mental Problems 2 2 2 4 4 0 4 8 0 Infrastructure
e.g. Station C
depends on

depends on
C User Class
e.g. Disease Pattern 4 0 2 4 Infrastructure Class
e.g. Type of station C
depends on

depends on
P Personal User Record
4 Station or Link Record
P
Calculation Record
2 4 4 4 0 0 2 8 4 Calculation Record

cd=
0

c...=
2

c2=
-4

c1=
-2

Fig. 2  Using class system to determine user and infrastructure element specific attributes

Determination of the specific description of an infrastructure element fol-


lows the same algorithm using the records of infrastructure description.
Calculation of penalty factor pui (User u uses infrastructure element i) for n
determined dimensions is done by calculation of the normalized distance in Rn, as
shown in Eq. 1 the distance in dimension d (Δcd) is calculated by the difference of
the user attribute in dimension d cud and the infrastructure attribute in this dimen-
sion cid. The normalized weight factor is calculated by Pythagoras and normalized
by division by maximal distance in the given dimension (see Eq. 2).
∆cd = cud − cid (1)

n 2
|∆�c| d=1 ∆cd
pui =  = √ (2)
∆�cmax  4 n
Calculation of the route efforts usually is done by minimizing two aspects speed
(time consumption) and costs, where most route planers use travel time as a target
dimension and add the cost as an informational aspect. This use case travel time
use used as a target dimension as well. This lead to the need to convert the penalty
in time to get a have a value to minimize. Since getting penalty factors from the
steps above, a weighted travel time can be calculated. Therefore all time consum-
ing usages of transport vehicles are multiplied with the specific penalty factor for
this user and vehicle and the usage of static infrastructure elements like stations is
considered by adding a summand that is calculated by multiplying the penalty fac-
tor with a user specific constant.
m
 0

tR = tvx + tsx (3)
x=1 x=1
Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities ... 17

m
 0

tuR = pux tvx + (tsx + pux wu ) (4)
x=1 x=1

Equation 3 shows the calculation of time consumption for a route (tR) as a sum
of time using m vehicles (tvx) and waiting/change vehicles at o stations (tsx).
Equation 4 shows the calculation of user specific weighted time consumptions
(tuR) using calculated penalties (pux) and personal (user specific) weight factor
(wu). During route planning both has to be used since the planning of change vehi-
cles has to be done with real travel time and not the weighted travel time.

5.4 Challenges in Bringing Overlays to ATMS

Adding additional scales to route planning causes generation of user specific


graph. Therefore a new algorithms to calculate optimal routes needs to be devel-
oped. Today’s algorithms assumes travel planning data is common for all users
and the target in being time efficient is the same for all users. So in terms of
minimizing data storage and computational time a common graph is kept for all
request. New algorithms has to consider that travel planning is finding an optimal
route respecting personal circumstances.

6 Using Simulations in Prediction of Traffic State

One of the most important steps in delivering mobility is to predict the state of
the traffic as well as the prediction of the state of transport system in urban area.
Based on these predictions a decision making process is set as a main process hav-
ing the role of providing the mobility services for citizens and freights. ATMS as
an autonomic system has to focus on this type of prediction for internal decision
making model and a simulation environment has to be defined internally.

6.1 Model and Simulation Environment

At this moment the decision making process related to traffic and transport sys-
tems has an important component based on various software platforms which per-
mit to model the traffic state as well as the state of transport systems. The chain of
using models as tools for prediction is shown in Fig. 3.
The elaboration of a model is an activity which is based on two categories
of inputs: the existing models and experiences, as a reference for a model, and
information from traffic a transport systems, this category forms the nucleon of
18 J. Schlingensiepen et al.

Fig. 3  Simulated models Inputs (from traffic and


as tool for decision making transport systems)
process Model
Inputs (from other
models and experiences)

Simulation environment

Simulated model

Outputs

Decision making process

the model (based on this information a model is elaborated). After the elaboration
of a model the elaboration of a simulated model in a simulation environment is
needed. This simulated model is created based on software platform which is able
to facilitate the usage of the model to create various scenarios based on traffic and
transport inputs. These scenarios could support in an efficient manner the decision
making process.

6.2 Simulation Environments

A simulation environment is a set of tools and simple models which is able to sup-
port the construction of complex models [55]. The majority of existing simulation
environments are developed based on software platforms.
Today’s software platforms2 are able to create an environment for traffic and
transport models and the following functionalities are built in:
• Analysis of transport demand—based on the 4 step model [60] (trip genera-
tion, trip distribution, mode choice, route choice) this analysis is the first step in
providing mobility services, and the system has to respond to this demand. The
4 step model is shown in Fig. 4.
• Network modelling—modelling of various transport systems, modes of trans-
port, user classes in the context of transport network as well as sub-network
generation.
• Public transport assignment procedures and operations—several exam-
ples of functionalities are: timetable-based assignment, headway-based assign-
ment, line blocking, modeling complex fare systems in one model, line costing
calculation.

2Examples of today’s software platforms for creation of models in simulation environments are:

Visum/Vissim [56], TransCAD [57], CUBE [58] and Aimsun [59].


Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities ... 19

Transport
system

Trip Trip Mode Route Flows


Generation Distribution Choice Choice

Activity
system

Fig. 4  Four step model for analysis of transport demand

• Private transport assignment procedures—convergent and fast assignment


procedures, simultaneous assignment of several user classes, as well as static
and dynamic assignment procedures.
• Traffic engineering—node impedance calculation, coding of various signal
control, signal optimization for green time, cycle time, and offset time.
• Analyses, reports and interfaces—scenario comparison, matrix histograms,
flow bundle calculation, interactive shortest path search, isochrones, environ-
mental analyses (noise, emissions), analysis of accident data.

6.3 Integration of Simulation in ATMS

All decisions are made based on models and the decisions in ATMS has to be
taken in a self made manner (the operator as decision maker is replaced by the
subsystems of the system).
The autonomic system has to use the simulation environments in its internal
decision making process and to model the traffic and transport system to do the
self-* properties without any external intervention. The functionalities of a software
platform could be integrated as main part of decision making “brain” of the system.
In an autonomic traffic management system a hybrid simulation is able to be
implemented as a combination from a classical simulation approach and some real
components of the system [61, 62]. The system is able to self configure the model
for simulation using real or simulated components depends of the level of hybrid
simulation selected:
• level 1—one simulated component and multi real components;
• level 2—multi simulated components and multi real components;
• level 3—multi simulated components and one real component;
• level 4—only simulated components are taken into consideration in the simu-
lated model.
The integration of simulation of models in ATMS is shown in Fig. 5.
20 J. Schlingensiepen et al.

Fig. 5  Integration of Network of sensors


simulation in ATMS

Data processing

Model's inputs

Simulated model Decision making process

Decisions (outputs)

The ATMS system collects autonomous data from sensors, processes this data
and provides information/inputs to a model and creates a simulated model based
on internal software platform. Information/outputs from the simulated model are
transmitted to decision making process and ATMS is able to emit decision inside
of the system.

7 Architecture of ATMS

A high level architecture of the autonomic transportation management system


(ATMS) is given in Fig. 6. The system includes the overlay network that connects
all service providers and sensors in the field and a backbone build on this network.
There are different type of back-end components providing simple or more com-
plex services to the system resp. the users.
In detail the system incorporates the following components:
• Sensors providing the data from the field as a base for all decisions made in the
system (Sect. 7.1)
• The overlay network collects and transports the required data from the sensors
and between the other component in the back-end (Sects. 7.2 and 7.3)
• Broker components to find services in the network and orchestrate them to get
higher level services (Sect. 7.7)
• Data providers providing access to data stored in data bases or made by fore-
cast (Sect. 7.7)
Using this general approach allows later implementation of services that are not
known today to fulfill future requirements without re-implementing the infrastruc-
ture by simply including new types of components to the system.
Today’s common approach to reduce complexity while implementing a distrib-
uted ICT is splitting up functions to different components providing this functions
to other component in a defined environment. This means the functions provided
Autonomic Transport Management Systems—Enabler for Smart Cities ... 21

Fig. 6  System Architecture: back-bone


service providing components Dataproviders
providers
Data
data providers
connected by overlay-
network
Broker
Broker
broker
components
components
components

overlay network

sensors

to and consumed from the system are seen as services, where the infrastructure has
to ensure that services can be found in the system and can be called by other com-
ponents. Usually this is done by implementing different components in a way they
meet a contract/service description resp. implementing an interface and so can be
replaced by alternative implementations. To allow service consumers finding a
suitable service provider services and their instance are listed in directories called
service registry and can be found using a lookup function provided by a service
broker [63, 64].
The most common understanding of services in this so called service oriented
architecture (SOA) is treating the service layer as a set of functions callable from
different systems. These calls are e.g. handing over a process to another system,
using a software component to do some calculations, get information from a data-
base etc. On implementation level this lead to the limitation, services do provide
functions a service consumer can call and get some result. Today’s very popular
implementations of SOA using web services shows this concept. In fact most peo-
ple use web service and SOA as synonymous.
We extend our earlier work [26] and propose an ATMS architecture as depicted
in Fig. 7. The figure shows that the ATMS back-bone has the general structure of
a distributed system. The separation between vehicles as moving parts and infra-
structure as the fixed parts is common. On both sites different information like data
about the current state (mainly collected by sensors) and plans (input by users and
operators) are collected. Based on this information it is possible to derive control
factors for the overall system. Therefore, this information must be brought together
and evaluated. Therefore a general subdivision of communication in vehicle-to-
vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) is commonly used. The main goal
of the overall system is fulfilling the plans of the users (road users, public trans-
port users and traffic system operators) while minimizing the number of resources.
Based on the aggregated data both the infrastructure and the vehicle make predic-
tions on the future state of the road and make local or global decisions. Figures 7
and 8 gives some examples of modules that interact through the ATMS Backbone.
The number of direct interactions between components is minimized since interac-
tion shall be done using data aggregation provided by the backbone. As seen in the
figure the plans of infrastructure provider are to optimize the utilization grade of the
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headstrong rebels should be swept away by the stroke of its formidable
wing!

This law, drafted entirely by him, with its every villainy cunningly
concealed, or placed in the light of a sacred duty, and as the only means of
assuring public safety, Robespierre would himself lay before the
Convention. The deputies, who had been insulted in the person of their
President by that brawling meddler arrested on the Place de la Révolution,
could not but pass the law, after such a scandalous scene. That public insult
of the riotous rebel was an excellent pretext. It would help him to take them
by surprise, to wring from them the vote which would place entirely at his
mercy not only his rivals who had expressed their opinions so freely, but
also that rude scoffer, already doomed to die.

His trial would not last long! But before his death he should be brought
before Robespierre. He should lay bare the most secret recesses of his soul,
denounce his accomplices, and disclose his connections and parentage.
Such an insult, the cruellest Robespierre had as yet sustained, demanded an
exemplary penalty. The death of the man himself would not suffice; he
should pay with the heads of every one connected with him in any way—
accomplices, friends, and relations. Ah! the wretch, he had sacrificed not
only his own life, but the lives of all near and dear to him!

Pondering still on the cross-examination he would so soon be able to


enforce, Robespierre descended into the dining-room, where the family had
assembled for supper. The table had not been laid out-of-doors, partly on
account of the uncertain weather, but more especially to divert
Robespierre's attention, by a change of surroundings, from the
remembrance of the last two days, and to turn into a fresh channel the secret
thoughts of their good friend, which they felt still dwelt on the failure of his
inauguration.

Robespierre found the family so bright and affable that his reappearance
was not embarrassing. He had but to explain vaguely the cause of his
indisposition, which was quite gone. Oh, yes! every one could see that!
Why, he looked so well, so full of life! What a good thing it was, after all,
to have had a day's rest!
But this conspiracy of smiles, which had put him at his ease so quickly,
soon began to irritate him. The whole family racked their brains to find
scraps of news and items of interest outside the one all-absorbing subject of
his thoughts. When the dessert came on, however, Robespierre himself
turned the conversation to the carefully avoided theme, and asked their
candid opinion of the previous day's fête.

As they resorted to evasions, giving a host of details to escape the main


question, he asked them plainly what they thought of his personal success.

"It was gigantic!" said Madame Duplay.

"Ah, that's a woman's answer—a mother's!" he replied sadly.

And longing for sympathy, he opened his heart to them; he had been
disappointed in his dearest hopes; everything must begin over again. Lebas
interrupted him.

"You exaggerate, I think."

Robespierre replied calmly—

"I am so far from exaggerating that I have passed the whole day in
preparing my revenge."

Here they were interrupted by a knock at the door, and young Duplay
rose to open it.

"Ah! it is Buonarotti!" they all exclaimed. "What a pleasant surprise!"

But it was not a surprise at all. The demoiselles Duplay had invited
Buonarotti to supper, a valuable and ever-welcome guest, in so far that he
played the harpsichord to perfection, and used to accompany Lebas, who
was always ready to show his talent on the violin. Buonarotti was an
original character, a Corsican by birth, claiming descent from Michaël-
Angelo. He was an ardent revolutionist, and an enthusiastic admirer of
Robespierre. He had begged to be excused from accepting the invitation to
dinner, but promised to come in afterwards to cheer up his friend.
The family took advantage of his entrance to leave the table and move
to the drawing-room, where music was soon started, in spite of the terrible
longing Buonarotti had to talk politics, and to give Robespierre an account
of the different opinions of the fête which he had picked up here and there.
But they had dragged him coaxingly to the harpsichord, laying a sonata of
Mozart before him, of which Lebas had already struck the first bars on his
violin.

In no other apartment was the hero-worship of the Duplays more


evident than in this drawing-room, with its furniture covered in Utrecht
velvet, where portraits of the Incorruptible faced each other in every
conceivable form and position—on the walls, on the tables, on the brackets,
and even on the harpsichord; in crayon, water-colours, plaster-cast
medallions, bronze, and terra-cotta. This was the sanctuary in which the
Duplays loved to congregate under the auspices of their demigod. It was
here they spent their evenings, when sometimes a few friends were
admitted to the intimacy of the family circle. The young women, seated at
the round table, would occupy themselves with sewing or embroidery,
whilst the men conversed on one subject or another, more often suggested
by some letters or reports among Robespierre's correspondence, which was
usually sorted by Lebas or Duplay.

The hours were sometimes enlivened by music, and sometimes also by


recitation. When there was music Lebas and Buonarotti carried off all the
honours, but in recitation it was Robespierre who triumphed, for he had
preserved from his youth the love of rhymed and sonorous phrases. As he
had read aloud to himself long ago in his little room at the Hôtel de Pontivy
the burning pages of "La Nouvelle Héloïse," so he read now, amidst these
austere Republican surroundings, the tragedies of Corneille and of Racine,
giving himself up to the magic sway of the rhythmic verse, a smile of
appreciation on his lips.

But that evening he was quite preoccupied, and gave but little attention
to the music, as he sat with his back to the mantelpiece, entirely absorbed in
the voluminous correspondence which had just reached him—letters,
reports, denunciations and the like. He sorted them feverishly, handing them
one by one to Simon the wooden-legged, who stood near him, either to
classify them or to throw them in the waste-paper basket. Mother Duplay,
ensconced in a deep armchair, was indulging in her after-dinner nap, whilst
old Duplay smoked his pipe, leaning on the window ledge to watch the
departure of some of the workmen kept late over some pressing work.
Young Maurice Duplay ran backwards and forwards from one group to
another, as lively and active as a squirrel.

Buonarotti, still at the harpsichord, was now playing the hymn to the
Supreme Being, by Gossec. The air fell on Robespierre's ears and brought
back the previous day's fête to his memory: the procession from the gardens
of the Tuileries; the affectation of the deputies in keeping so far behind him
to make it appear that he had already assumed the role of Dictator; the
whole plot which he felt was undermining the popular rejoicings; and the
untoward scene of that final insult. All this and more was suggested by that
hymn composed to celebrate his apotheosis, but reminding him to-day of
his defeat. His defeat! yes, nothing less than defeat! These anonymous
letters, inspired by hatred and envy, proved it only too plainly, and it was
emphasised by the reports of his police agents, in whose obsequious
language a certain embarrassment could be detected.

Just then Didier, the chief agent, entered, bringing the latest news, and
when Robespierre asked him his impression of the fête, he declared it to
have been perfect.

"You are lying!" said Robespierre.

Brought to bay by the Incorruptible's questions, the police agent owned


the truth. The affair bad been a disastrous failure. It was the fault of the
organisers, of Didier's own scouts. Every one, in fact, was to blame. The
men hired to applaud had been imprudently paid in advance. They had
drunk hard, lingered in the taverns, and only arrived on the scene when the
fête was already compromised. Didier gave him other details, corroborating
the reports which had just reached him, and opened his eyes to things
ignored before. Robespierre was dumfounded on hearing of the audacious
conduct of his enemies. He called Duplay, who was still at the window, to
seek counsel with him. But Didier, emboldened by the interest which the
Incorruptible took in his disclosures, ventured himself to proffer advice.
"Between ourselves," he said, "the guillotine is becoming unpopular."

And he confessed that the young fanatic's cry of "Down with the
scaffold!" at the fête, seemed to have been trembling on the lips of a
considerable number of the spectators, who were more than half inclined to
protect the insulter from the violence of the crowd.

"They are heartily sick of it," he continued. "Another proof of this is the
protest the inhabitants near the Bastille have been making against its
erection there. The Committee of Public Safety had to see into the affair to-
day in your absence, and have decided that the guillotine should be
transported to the Barrière du Trône."

This last piece of news exasperated Robespierre beyond measure. What!


His colleagues of the Committee dared to take such an important step in his
absence? And that, too, the very day after he had been publicly insulted! In
truth, the moment was well chosen to show themselves ashamed of the
scaffold! And as Robespierre questioned Duplay on the number of prisoners
condemned during the day, he was astonished to learn that there were only
fifteen. Had the Tribunal then been won over by the Conspiracy of the
Lenient? However, the carpenter assured him that it was simply a
coincidence, for he had heard Fouquier-Tinville, the Public Prosecutor,
remark at the conclusion of the sitting that if things continued at this rate
there would never be an end of it. There were, it appeared, at that moment
seven thousand prisoners under lock and key.

"Fouquier-Tinville is right," said Robespierre; "things move too slowly."

"But how can they go quicker?" asked Duplay, who regarded his
juryman's duties as sacred.

"Have patience! I have my plans."

"May we hear them?"

"You shall know to-morrow. I must first of all make an example of that
young fanatic, with whom it is time to deal."
And turning to Didier he asked—

"Where is he?"

"A few steps from here, at the police station of the Rue Saint-Florentin,
where Héron has locked him up, pending your orders."

"Very well! Bid Héron bring him here; I wish to examine him instantly."

The peremptory tone admitted no reply. Didier, wishing the company


good-night, left the room with Simon Duplay, whom the Incorruptible had
charged with several messages, and Cornélie, taking advantage of their
departure, called Robespierre to the harpsichord.

"And now, I hope you will take a little notice of us," she said, coming
towards him in half petulant, half coquettish mood.

Robespierre, softening at her approach, kissed her hand. Only let him
have the time to answer a letter from his friend Saint-Just, and he would be
entirely at her disposal. And he seated himself at the round table to write.
Only Buonarotti played now. Lebas had laid down his violin, and whilst
filling his pipe asked Robespierre for news of the Army of the North, where
Saint-Just then was. All was going well there. Robespierre had also good
news from his brother Augustin, then at Lyons, and on the point of
returning. Augustin warmly recommended to him a young general of the
artillery whom he had known at Nice, and who had already distinguished
himself at Toulon.

"Augustin tells me that this young man could replace, to some


advantage, that drunkard Hauriot as commander of the armed force of
Paris."

Buonarotti, who was still at the harpischord, turned at the mention of


Toulon.

"Bonaparte?" he said.

Robespierre looked across. He knew him, then?


Yes, he knew him. They had lived together in Corsica. And as the
Incorruptible asked what were the sentiments of the young soldier, he
replied—

"Excellent. He is Republican to the core."

"Well, we shall see," said Robespierre, favourably inclined to a change,


adverse as he was to the idea of a military commander remaining too long
in the same post.

And he began his letter to Saint-Just, at the same time lending an ear to
Lebas, who was telling Duplay of certain rumours coming from the army of
the aspiration of some of its chiefs to the dictatorship. But Duplay
interrupted him—

"Sapristi! I had almost forgotten!"

Robespierre raised his eyes inquiringly.

"I have a letter also to give you."

"From whom?" asked the Incorruptible, reassured as soon as he knew it


was only a letter.

"From a prisoner, I think, who very innocently confided it to one of our


spies. It was given to me just now at the Tribunal."

Duplay searched in his pockets, and having found the letter, handed it to
Robespierre, who continued writing.

"Look at it with Lebas," he said.

Lebas took the letter, and going to the mantel-piece, commenced to read
it by the light of a candle. Duplay, in the act of filling his pipe, looked over
his shoulder.

It was Clarisse's letter to Robespierre, and read thus—


"I should not write to you if I had only my own life to plead for. But I
have to protect that of two children, my niece imprisoned here with me and
a son of nineteen years, who may be arrested at any moment and sent to the
scaffold, and good God, by whom! CLARISSE."

Robespierre had now finished his letter to Saint-Just, and whilst closing
it, asked—

"Well, and the letter?"

"It is a woman who supplicates you for her niece imprisoned with her,"
answered Lebas.

Robespierre, annoyed, stopped him, saying curtly that he received


twenty such letters every day.

"She also supplicates you for her son," added Lebas, still perusing the
note.

Robespierre simply shrugged his shoulders and sealed his letter to


Saint-Just.

"Always the same refrain!" he said.

"Shall I throw it in the basket, then?"

"Yes, do, for goodness' sake!"

But Duplay took the letter from Lebas's hands, twisted it into a spill,
and ignited it at the candle to light his pipe.

Robespierre now rose and went towards the harpsichord, where he was
received with joyous exclamations.

"Here you are at last!"

Cornélie whispered a few words to Buonarotti, and placed a new piece


of music before him.
"As a reward," she said, "Buonarotti will sing you one of his latest
compositions."

"And the words are by a friend of yours," added Madame Lebas, with a
mysterious air.

Robespierre, puzzled, asked the name of this friend, but Victoire wished
him to guess, and when he demurred a battle of words ensued, in which his
stronger will prevailed.

"Very well, then! We will tell you the poet's name."

And as he was all attention, they exclaimed in chorus—

"Maximilian Robespierre!"

The Incorruptible smiled. What were they talking about? He the author
of a poem!

"Yes."

Before he had time to protest, Cornélie recited the first verse—

"Crois-moi, jeune et belle Ophélie..."

Ah, yes! They were right. Robespierre remembered the piece now. He
had composed it at Arras, and read it in public before the Society of the
Rosati, of which he was a member. He went on with the verse from
memory, while Cornélie followed in the book—
"Si flatteur que soit ton miroir,
Sois charmante avec modestie,
Fais semblant de n'en rien savoir."
What! had Buonarotti really set that to music? Robespierre was very
curious to hear it.

"With pleasure!" said the Corsican.

Madame Lebas, seated at the piano, struck the first chord of the
accompaniment, and Buonarotti commenced the song. Every one had
gathered round the singer.

The first verse was greeted with loud applause.

Ah, how pretty it was! How well the music chimed in with the words!
What simplicity! What grace!

Robespierre, delighted, joined in the chorus of praise, congratulating


Buonarotti.

Suddenly every one stopped. An ominous cry came through the open
window—

"Buy to-day's list of the condemned."

It was the voice of newsvendors calling out the result of the day's sitting
at the Revolutionary Tribunal. The Incorruptible showed signs of
uneasiness. Buonarotti had already begun the second verse—
"Sur le pouvair de tes appas
Demeure toujours alarmée..."

But a new cry was heard—

"Winning numbers! ... Lottery of Sainte-Guillotine! Buy! Buy!"

"Shut that window!" Robespierre called out impatiently.

The boy Maurice ran to do so.


"Why!" he exclaimed, "here is Héron, and three people with him."

At Héron's name Robespierre turned round sharply, and as every one


seemed surprised at the untimely visit, he explained—

"Oh, it's all right! I expected him. He is bringing the young villain of
yesterday's fête."

"Ah yes," said the women, "the chouan of the Place de la Concorde!"
and they looked curiously towards the door, at which the new-comers were
now knocking.

"Come in!" cried Duplay.

Héron entered and bowed to every one in the room.

"Is the culprit with you?" asked Robespierre nervously.

The police-agent replied in the affirmative, and was ordered to


introduce the prisoner. Héron turned and signed to two men, who appeared
escorting Olivier, pale and dejected, his hands tied behind his back. The
young man, no longer resisting, seemed already to offer himself as a victim.

"He is a nice-looking fellow," observed Madame Lebas, in a low voice.

Héron pushed Olivier forward, who, perfectly indifferent to his


impending cross-examination, stood sullenly aside. Robespierre, always
mistrustful, made a rapid survey of the young man from head to foot,
keeping, however, at a safe distance from the fettered prisoner.

"What have you learnt about him?" he asked Héron.

The agent did not know much. The day before, while under arrest, the
prisoner had let fall some words by which Héron understood that his
mother, arrested with a young girl he loved, was threatened with the
scaffold. But since his imprisonment he had been completely mute. No one
had been able to draw a word from him, and things would have very likely
remained thus had not Madame Beaugrand, a lodging-house keeper of the
Rue du Rocher, come to the police-station for the purpose of obtaining
some particulars of the arrest, the news of which had reached her. From the
description of the young man she fancied he might be one of her lodgers,
who had arrived the day before, and inscribed himself under the name of
Germain, blacksmith's apprentice. Brought face to face with the prisoner,
she exclaimed immediately, "Oh yes! it is he! most certainly!"

"And his papers!" asked Robespierre.

"He had none! Not even a passport! They had only found in his
possession a set of keys, some paper-money in assignats, a pocket-book,
and some small change in a purse." As he spoke, Héron placed these
articles on the table.

"And no arms?" interposed Robespierre again.

The police-agent replied in the negative.

"Untie his hands. We shall see if they are a workman's."

Duplay examined them, the women watching with great interest the
while. The carpenter declared it to be very possible, as the hands looked
used to handling wood and iron.

"In war, most likely!" said Robespierre.

The Incorruptible then stated his suspicions more precisely. The man
was perhaps a chouan, come in disguise from Vendée to stab him in the
excitement of the fête!

The women cried out in horror at the thought, and added, "Of course he
was not without accomplices!"

As this idea fastened in his mind, Robespierre wished to know if the


young man's room had been searched. Héron had not neglected to do so, as
could well be imagined! He had, however, only found a few scattered
clothes and a valise, which one of his men had with him. He had brought it
to open before Robespierre.

"Why didn't you say so, then? Be quick and open it!"
Héron tried a set of keys, and after some delay the valise was unlocked.

The police-agent examined its contents, and enumerated them: linen,


articles of toilet, and an ivory casket mounted in silver. He took out the
ivory casket, which drew a cry of admiration from mother Duplay, and
passed it from hand to hand. Héron then drew forth a rather heavy roll, from
which he tore the paper wrapper, disclosing a number of louis d'or. He
deposited them on the table, and set to work to count them, remarking that
the young apprentice was, after all, richer than himself!

Meanwhile the agent continued his search.

"Ah, some letters!" he exclaimed.

"Give them to Lebas," said Robespierre.

Lebas took the packet from the agent's hands.

"Go and examine them by the mantelpiece under the lamp," Robespierre
continued, "and tell me their contents."

The curiosity of the women had now reached its height. Héron had
drawn out a gold medallion, encircled with small pearls.

"Those are real pearls," observed mother Duplay.

The medallion was opened, and found to contain a lock of fair hair, with
the initials M.T. The jewel was handed round, admired, and examined
carefully, giving rise to all sorts of reflections, in Olivier's presence, who
looked on apparently unconcerned.

Robespierre was exasperated at this indifference. He knew, however,


how to restrain himself, and said mockingly—

"You will not tell me, I suppose, that there is nothing extraordinary for a
sum of money like that and such jewels to be found in the possession of an
apprentice?"
Héron insinuated that perhaps he had stolen them, at which Olivier
simply shrugged his shoulders. Duplay endorsed Héron's opinion. In fact,
he had not the slightest doubt about it. The young man had stolen them.

Olivier could bear it no longer.

"Everything there belongs to me!" he said.

And as they seemed still to doubt, he repeated in a loud voice—

"Everything belongs to me! And, since you seem so anxious about it,
know that I am an aristocrat, a royalist, and a chouan!"

The men cried out almost with one voice—

"At last! He owns it!"

Olivier took up the word at once.

"Very well! Since I have owned it, why don't you get quit of me, and
send me forthwith to the scaffold? I am weary of it all!"

But Robespierre calmly told him not to be in such a hurry, for he wished
to know his name. As the young man defied him, saying he would have to
ask elsewhere, for he should never learn it from him, Robespierre grew
furious. He must have his name, and the names of his accomplices as well,
for he was not single-handed; that was certain!

"And if I have no accomplice, you will find some, I'll be bound!" cried
Olivier ironically. "But you shall not have my name!"

Lebas, having finished the letters, came forward, and Robespierre gave
him a questioning glance. The letters, he said, revealed nothing in
particular. They had been written two or three years ago, and bore no
address or signatures of importance. Two signed Marie Thérèse were
apparently from a young girl, the prisoner's sister or fiancée.

"Then the medallion belongs to her," put in Victoire; "M.T. are the
initials on it."
But these letters revealed nothing, nor did three others signed "Your
mother," couched in terms of endearment and advice. The style was most
certainly that of an aristocrat. Only one letter—dated 1791—gave a slight
indication, a very vague one.

Robespierre pricked up his ears—

"And the contents of that letter?" he asked.

Lebas scanned it once more. It was dated 1791, from a country place in
one of the suburbs of Paris, and addressed to the young man, then a student,
by his grandfather, who seemed also to be his godfather, for he says: "I shall
expect you to-morrow evening, for my fête and yours, the Feast of St.
Olivier."

"Is Olivier, then, his name?" inquired Robespierre, looking at the young
man.

But Lebas continued reading. "The valet, my dear child, will not fetch
you this time. At fifteen a lad ought to be able to travel alone."

"The letter being dated May, 1791, the young man must be now
nineteen," Lebas observed.

"Nineteen! yes, just nineteen!" repeated Robespierre, as if a thought had


struck him. "Go on! Go on? What comes next?"

Lebas continued: "My travelling-coach will wait for you in the Rue des
Lions, before the door of the hotel."

"There can be only one Rue des Lions in Paris, the Rue des Lions-Saint-
Paul?" interposed Robespierre, more and more impressed, and still looking
intently at the youth.

"Just so!" Lebas answered.

"Go on with the letter! Go on!"

Lebas resumed his reading: "Benoit..."


"The concierge!" interrupted Robespierre, scarcely able to hide his
emotion.

Lebas went on: "Benoit will open the shutters of the little room leading
out of my study to the garden. In a bookcase, the one surmounted by the
busts of Cicero and Socrates, you will find just within your reach, and will
bring to me, volumes x. and xi. of a set of folios bound in red morocco,
with the title..."

"Arrêts du Parlement!" exclaimed Robespierre, to the general surprise,


carried beyond himself by the revelation which had suddenly burst upon
him.

Olivier looked at him, in bewilderment.

"That is it! Arrêts du Parlement," repeated Lebas; "but how did you
know?"

Robespierre, mastering his feelings, and without taking his eyes off
Olivier, answered with assumed indifference—

"Oh! I have had those books in my hands many a time at Monsieur de


Pontivy's, King's Councillor in Parliament, and that young man's
grandfather."

Olivier turned deadly pale, and grasped convulsively at the back of a


chair for support. His mother was lost! Exclamations of surprise and
astonishment had greeted the Incorruptible's words. Then Robespierre knew
his family, and all about him? And all eyes were fixed on the young man
with renewed curiosity.

"Yes ... I know," ... answered Robespierre, forcing himself to appear


calm, "I know ... who he is..."

"Oh, now we shall hear the whole story!" they all exclaimed, clapping
their hands.
"Certainly you shall," Robespierre replied, "but in order to make sure I
should like to be alone with him. We are too many here; I shall call you
back presently. Let Héron and the police-agents wait in the courtyard."

Every one prepared to leave the room, looking rather disappointed,


specially the women, who wondered what would be the outcome of it all.

As Lebas was passing out Robespierre stopped him.

"Don't go," he said, "I may want you."

And the three men remained alone.

The father was face to face with his son!

Robespierre's anger had all melted before this sudden revelation. He


preserved, however, a stern countenance, subduing the almost
uncontrollable emotion which threatened to overpower him. He was still
struggling with it, trying to regain possession of himself, and, moved by a
natural impulse, he told Olivier in a gentle voice to be seated.

The prisoner, however, did not heed him, and when Robespierre
repeated his words even more persuasively, and in a trembling voice,
Olivier still paid no attention. Seeing Lebas shrug his shoulders, intimating
that Robespierre was really very good to insist, the Incorruptible explained
—his eyes still fixed on Olivier—that it was but natural for him to show
kindness towards the grandchild of a man whose secretary he had been for
eighteen months.

The young man stared back in surprise.

"They never told you, then?" said Robespierre. "Of course not.... They
loathe my very name, your people, do they not?"

But he immediately added, to Lebas's astonishment, that this was no


reason why he should forget his stay in Monsieur de Pontivy's house. He
could not help thinking now of the happy evenings he had spent there and
the many pleasant meals of which he had partaken, side by side with
Olivier's mother. That dim, sweet spirit of the past, which the young man's
presence had called from its grave, had softened his heart strangely towards
him.

But Olivier interrupted him harshly. Robespierre might harden his heart
again, then! His life was in Robespierre's hands! He could take it if it
pleased him to do so. All the family had been victims to the Revolution: his
grandfather who died of grief, his uncle killed in Vendée, his father mortally
wounded defending the cause of the King....

"But your mother? She is alive; you have not the right to sacrifice her
life!"

Robespierre went on thus carefully, trying by well-placed insinuations


and questions to wring the truth from him. If Olivier had cried "Down with
the scaffold!" it was because he trembled for his mother's life? ... because
she was arrested?

"Am I not right in this?" he urged, with deep anxiety. "Is she not
arrested?"

But he was met by a blunt denial.

And so the struggle between father and son went on; the former
impatient to learn the woman's hiding-place, the latter firm and unshaken in
his refusal to betray it to one whom he regarded as a tiger seeking his prey.

Robespierre, though wounded by every syllable, continued his soft


persuasions. What! was it possible Olivier could not understand his wish to
protect his mother, and to place her out of harm's reach, in memory of the
time he had passed so happily at her side?

Olivier smiled in bitter irony. Robespierre need not waste his words. He
well knew he had too much pride to allow any such remembrance to incline
him to leniency. Ah, there were memories in that sweet past, as he called it,
for which his mother would pay with her head! Friendship? Robespierre's
friendship! Why, it paved the road to the scaffold! All his friends had
trodden that deadly path.
A cry of indignation escaped Lebas, but Robespierre quieted him in a
husky voice, himself a prey to the most feverish agitation. The lad's head
had been turned by the chouans! He was not responsible for what he said!
Then turning to Olivier he tried, with a ring of sadness in his voice, to
persuade him that had he been a tyrant he would have punished his
insolence, he would not have attempted to reason with him. But Olivier
remained unmoved. This kindness was assumed, he told himself, to hide
some dastardly plot! Robespierre only wanted to find his mother that he
might avenge her son's insult on herself. In vain the Incorruptible protested,
deeply grieved and wounded. Olivier stoutly maintained his position,
declaring that Robespierre was not a man to pardon any one who had
publicly insulted him with such outspoken contempt and hatred.

"Wretch!" cried out Lebas.

But Robespierre signed to him to stop. Hatred? That word in the young
man's mouth sounded like blasphemy. And trying to master himself, that his
voice should not tremble, he asked him—

"Then you do hate me very much?"

Olivier again furiously asserted his abhorrence, and was met by the
question—

"When have I ever wronged you?"

At this Olivier, losing self-control, nearly betrayed his secret.

"Wronged me! ... When have you wronged me?" the young man
repeated. "Wasn't it through you that my mother was..."

But recollecting himself he stopped short.

"Arrested?" put in Robespierre.

"No!" exclaimed Olivier.

And then the struggle recommenced.


Robespierre was, however, quite sure now of the arrest. What he wanted
to know was the name of the prison to which the two women had been
taken, and he came near to the chair by which the prisoner was standing.
Olivier instinctively recoiled a step, Robespierre, completely exhausted,
made one last effort. He implored the young man to lay aside his mistrust
and hatred, to help him to save those who were so dear to him.

"To help you to kill them, you mean!"

Robespierre started from his seat, exasperated beyond measure. This


was going too far! Olivier must be mad! Could he not, would he not realise
that the very way to kill the two unhappy women was to leave them for the
executioner to do his work! Their turn would soon come.

"If yours does not come first!" interrupted Olivier.

What madness! Perhaps at this very moment they were entering the cart
which was to take them to the Revolutionary Tribunal, and the next day to
the scaffold. It was Olivier who was sending them to death, and all because
he was too obstinate to say the word which would save them! He was a
blind, unnatural son; he would kill his own mother!

Olivier, though amazed at Robespierre's persistence, remained


unshaken.

"Are you so thirsty for her blood?" he cried, hurling at him this last
insult.

At these words Robespierre lost all self-control.

"Fool!" he cried, "insensate fool!" as he paced the room in unrestrained


excitement.

But Lebas had heard enough.

"Let us have done with this madman," he said, hurrying towards the
door to call in the police-agents.

But Robespierre turned round—

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