Focusing on a clearer and more visible passenger information, Swiss Federal Railways SBB modernized the general displays in the biggest Swiss railway stations. The former mechanical palette displays were replaced by LED screens of up to 5 meters width. In case of severe traffic disruptions these monitors are used for providing the passenger with general information. Additionally, a huge (perhaps the biggest) map based on OpenLayers 3 is shown on the monitor enabling the passenger to get a fast overview of the situation. The key component of the service-based architecture is the geographical content management system Cartaro. It is used by the employees in the SBB operation centers for composing and editing the information to display. Among issues like performance, reliability and availability a major challenge for the system was the development of tools for the fast and simple creation of a clear and appealing map. The software automatically generates a map based on real-time timetable information, identifies the affected stations and highlights the interrupted route using a routing-based approach. A set of integrated spatial editing tools enables the user to e.g. modify route geometries at different generalization levels and to align map labels. |