Phd Thesis Prince Singh
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An Integration Platform for Synchromodal Transport Prince Mayurank Singh AN INTEGRATION PLATFORM FOR SYNCHROMODAL TRANSPORT Prince Mayurank Singh AN INTEGRATION PLATFORM FOR SYNCHROMODAL TRANSPORT PROEFSCHRIFT ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit Twente, op gezag van de rector magnificus, prof. dr. T. T. M. Palstra, volgens besluit van het College voor Promoties in het openbaar te verdedigen op woensdag 18 September 2019 om 12:45 uur door Prince Mayurank Singh geboren op 20 November 1987 te Prayagraj, India Dit proefschrift is goedgekeurd door: promotor prof. dr. ir. R. J. Wieringa copromotor dr. M. J. van Sinderen DSI Ph.D. Thesis Series No. 19-014 Digital Society Institute. P.O. Box 217, 7500 AE, Enschede, The Netherlands SIKS Dissertation Series No. 2019-26. The research reported in this thesis has been carried out under the auspices of SIKS, the Dutch Research School for In- formation and Knowledge Systems. The research reported in this thesis has been partially funded by the Dutch Institute for Advanced Logistics (DI- NALOG), under the project Synchro- modalIT. Printed by: Ipskamp Printing, Enschede, (NL). ISBN: 978-90-365-4821-2 ISSN: 2589-7721 DOI: 10.3990/1.9789036548212 https://doi.org/10.3990/1.9789036548212 ©2019 Prince Mayurank Singh, The Netherlands. All rights reserved. No parts of this thesis may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without permission of the author. Alle rechten voorbehouden. Niets uit deze uitgave mag worden vermenigvuldigd, in enige vorm of op enige wijze, zonder voorafgaande schriftelijke toestemming van de auteur. PROMOTIECOMMISSIE: Voorzitter prof. dr. J. N. Kok University of Twente Promoter prof. dr. ir. R. J. Wieringa University of Twente Copromotor dr. ir. M. J. van Sinderen University of Twente Leden prof. dr. M. E. Iacob University of Twente dr. L. Ferreira Pires University of Twente prof. dr. ing. K. D. Thoben University of Bremen dr. S. Nurcan University of Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne prof. dr. J. Pontus KTH Royal Institute of Technology i ii Acknowledgment A PhD is quite a long journey, with many ups and downs. I was fortunate to have more ups than downs, owing to supportive colleagues and friends. I thank Marten, for presenting me the opportunity to pursue my PhD in UTwente. I am sure that Marten is the best guide a PhD student can have. Since my MSc. education days, throughout my PhD, in 7 years, I have learnt a lot from him. I already miss our fixed meeting slot, Thursdays 11:00 am, when I could express all my ideas, so freely. Perhaps unknowingly, Marten taught me a realistic approach towards life. I thank Roel, a constant guiding light for me since 2012, when I first attended DSRM classes. I have yet to meet someone who can simplify and analyze problems as Roel can, I doubt I ever will. His constant support, while I was writing my dissertation is the main reason I was (finally) able to complete it. I will always remember Roel, as the ever smiling Prof. Thanks to Haakan, Enrico, Rizal, Aditya, Naveen, Deepak, Kartikey, Sanne, Rachel, Daniel and Choung for those hangouts which ensured my sanity after office hours. Without them, my PhD journey would not have been as fun as it was. Suse and Bertine, I don’t know what I would have done, without their support and ar- rangements. I am grateful to Tom and Luuk for their encouragement and faith in me. Thanks to Dina, Lijia, Guanlian and Ahmed-Reza, for lunch time mini-conferences and being awesome friends. Their recurring question, When are you defending your PhD?, has played a huge role in the completion of my dissertation. Above all, I thank my family and God for their blessings. Prince 20th August 2018 iii iv Summary Transportation sector plays an important role in the growth of national economies. Advances in information technology have facilitated new collaboration opportunities among transport companies. Ubiquitous and faster internet now enables transport companies to access real time data about events in a transport network. New collaboration opportunities and access to real time data, have given rise to new transport practices. Synchromodal Transport (SmT) or Synchromodality, is a new transport practice, where the route and trans- port mode for transporting cargo is chosen dynamically, i.e., while the cargo is in-transit. If a disruption event occurs, causing a delay in transportation, the cargo may be shifted to another transport mode. Existing research over SmT is biased towards routing and capacity planning challenges posed by SmT. Data integration challenges posed by SmT, have not received their due attention from researchers. The primary data integration challenge is the integration of contextual events data and transport planning data. This disserta- tion provides a solution to data integration challenges posed by SmT, by designing a Synchromodal Transport Integration Platform (SmTIP). I, designed SmTIP based on the results of three research activities. The first research activity is SmT stake- holders’ interview, which resulted in a list of requirements for SmTIP. The second research activity is analysis of SmT practices, which resulted in a list of relevant contextual events and processes for a SmT scenario. The third research activity is studying the state-of-the-art in integration platform design, which resulted in a refer- ence architecture for integration platforms. I, then, developed a prototype based on SmTIP. The prototype integrates transport data and contextual events data, enables dynamic transport planning and in case of a disruption event, changing the transport mode of cargo. When representatives from transport companies used SmTIP prototype, their responses induced im- provements in SmTIP design. This dissertation is useful for transport companies, researchers in transportation sector and information tech- nology sector. Transport companies can get acquainted with, SmT processes, relevant contextual events, data integration challenges posed by SmT and how to overcome them. Researchers in transportation sector, can use this dissertation as an introduction to SmT. It will help them un- derstand SmT scenario, SmT processes and relevant disruption events. Documented responses of transport companies’ representatives during SmTIP validation will help researchers in the future improvement of SmTIP and in designing validation experiment setups. This dissertation enhances SmT research. It fills the research gap of SmT data integration challenges by: (1) identifying the data integration challenges, (2) listing the re- quirements for SmTIP, and (3) designing SmTIP to overcome them. Researchers and practitioners in information technology, can use the reference architecture for integration plat- forms to address data integration challenges in different application domains. For that purpose, the refinement of the reference architecture to SmT domain, as shown in this dissertation, may be used as a guide. v vi Samenvatting De transportsector speelt in vele landen een belangrijke rol bij economische activiteiten en de groei van de nationale economie. Vooruitgang in informatietechnologie heeft nieuwe samenwerkingsmogelijkheden tussen transportbedrijven mogelijk gemaakt. Alomtegenwoordig en sneller internet biedt nu vervoersbedrijven toe- gang tot real-time gegevens over de status en gebeurtenissen in een transportnetwerk. Nieuwe samenwerk- ingsmogelijkheden en toegang tot real-time gegevens hebben geleid tot nieuwe vervoerspraktijken. Synchromodaal Transport (SmT), of Synchromodaliteit, is een nieuwe vervoerspraktijk, waarbij de route en modaliteit voor het transport van lading dynamisch wordt gekozen, d.w.z. terwijl de lading onderweg is. Als het transport wordt vertraagd door het optreden van een verstoringsgebeurtenis kan de lading worden ver- plaatst naar een andere transportmodaliteit. Bestaand onderzoek naar synchromodaliteit is vooral gericht op problemen met betrekking tot routering en capaciteitsplanning. Gegevensintegratieproblemen als gevolg van synchromodaliteit hebben tot nu toe geen of weinig aandacht gekregen van onderzoekers. De primaire uitdaging bij gegevensintegratie voor synchro- modaliteit is de integratie van gegevens over contextuele gebeurtenissen en gegevens over transportplanning. Dit proefschrift draagt bij aan een oplossing voor de uitdagingen op het gebied van gegevensintegratie voor synchromodaliteit, door een Synchromodal Transport Integration Platform (SmTIP) te ontwerpen. SmTIP is gebaseerd op de resultaten van drie onderzoeksactiviteiten. De eerste onderzoeksactiviteit betreft het interviewen van SmT stakeholders, wat resulteerde in een lijst met vereisten voor SmTIP. De tweede onder- zoeksactiviteit is de analyse van SmT werkwijzen, wat resulteerde in een lijst met contextuele gebeurtenissen en processen voor een SmT-scenario. De derde onderzoeksactiviteit omvat de studie van state-of-art integratieplat- formen, wat resulteerde in een referentiearchitectuur voor integratieplatforms. Ik heb toen een prototype ontwikkeld op basis van SmTIP. Het prototype integreert transportgegevens en gegevens over contextuele gebeurtenissen, maakt dynamische transportplanning mogelijk en verandert de transportmodaliteit van lading in het geval van een relevante verstoringsgebeurtenis. Het prototype is vervol- gens gedemonstreerd aan een aantal transportbedrijven en op basis van verzamelde reacties van de bedrijven verder verbeterd. Dit proefschrift is nuttig voor transportbedrijven, onderzoekers in de transportsector en informatietechnologie.