Study of the applicability of cognitive path algorithms for 3D indoor navigation

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Human Centric Routing Algorithm for Urban Cyclists and the Influence of Street Network Spatial Configuration

Treball Final de Màster Universitari Erasmus Mundus en Tecnologia Geoespacial (Pla de 2013). Codi: SIW013. Codi: SBA032. Curs: 2019/2020Understanding wayfinding behavior of cyclist aid decision makers to design better cities in favor of this sustainable active transport. Many have modelled the physical influence of building environment on wayfinding behavior, with cyclist route choices and routing algorithm. Incorporating cognitive wayfinding approach with Space Syntax techniques not only adds the human centric element to model routing algorithm, but also opens the door to evaluate spatial configuration of cities and its effect on cyclist behavior. This thesis combines novel Space Syntax techniques with Graph Theory to develop a reproducible Human Centric Routing Algorithm and evaluates how spatial configuration of cities influences modelled wayfinding behavior. Valencia, a concentric gridded city, and Cardiff with a complex spatial configuration are chosen as the case study areas. Significant differences in routes distribution exist between cities and suggest that spatial configuration of the city has an influence on the modelled routes. Street Network Analysis is used to further quantify such differences and confirms that the simpler spatial configuration of Valencia has a higher connectivity, which could facilitate cyclist wayfinding. There are clear implications on urban design that spatial configuration with higher connectivity indicates legibility, which is key to build resilience and sustainable communities. The methodology demonstrates automatic, scalable and reproducible tools to create Human Centric Routing Algorithm anywhere in the world. Reproducibility self-assessment (https://osf.io/j97zp/): 3, 3, 3, 2, 1 (Input data, Preprocessing, Methods, Computational Environment and Results)

Human centric routing algorithm for urban cyclists and the influence of street network spatial configuration

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Geospatial TechnologiesUnderstanding wayfinding behavior of cyclist aid decision makers to design better cities in favor of this sustainable active transport. Many have modelled the physical influence of building environment on wayfinding behavior, with cyclist route choices and routing algorithm. Incorporating cognitive wayfinding approach with Space Syntax techniques not only adds the human centric element to model routing algorithm, but also opens the door to evaluate spatial configuration of cities and its effect on cyclist behavior. This thesis combines novel Space Syntax techniques with Graph Theory to develop a reproducible Human Centric Routing Algorithm and evaluates how spatial configuration of cities influences modelled wayfinding behavior. Valencia, a concentric gridded city, and Cardiff with a complex spatial configuration are chosen as the case study areas. Significant differences in routes distribution exist between cities and suggest that spatial configuration of the city has an influence on the modelled routes. Street Network Analysis is used to further quantify such differences and confirms that the simpler spatial configuration of Valencia has a higher connectivity, which could facilitate cyclist wayfinding. There are clear implications on urban design that spatial configuration with higher connectivity indicates legibility, which is key to build resilience and sustainable communities. The methodology demonstrates automatic, scalable and reproducible tools to create Human Centric Routing Algorithm anywhere in the world. Reproducibility self-assessment (https://osf.io/j97zp/): 3, 3, 3, 2, 1 (Input data, Preprocessing, Methods, Computational Environment and Results)

Developing a Pedestrian Route Network Service (PRNS)

Route network service is becoming increasingly popular. However, although there are significant amount of route network services there are still limitations especially to pedestrian network services. Pedestrians daily make decision about their navigation choices. Developing a pedestrian route network service (PRNS) involves several factors. During this study the analysis of several routing network services have demonstrated that the geographical data is one of the most important factors in order to develop an own PRNS. Considering the idea of estimation two different datasets for the PRNS were evaluated OpenStreetMap (OSM) and Swedish national road database (NVDB). The use of the OSM dataset for developing the PRNS was made after the comparison between both the dataset. OSM has shown more advantages in terms of completeness of route for pedestrian navigation than NVDB. The OSM dataset was created and stored in the PostGIS database. The implementation of own pedestrian network service is intended to facilitate the developments of new PRNS and analysis and comparison of others existing PRNS. The calculation and collection of the routes to be displayed for the user are performed by extended tools within PostGIS such as pgRouting and PostgreSQL respectively. The dataset’s network topology is related to the distance and determination of route choice by the pedestrian. Thus, Geographical Information System (GIS) is also one fundamental factor used in this study to evaluate and create results. The application was implemented in the city of Lund. One of the limitations developing the PRNS is the lack of documentation for new functions which are released by pgRouting developers. Although OSM provides an essential network for developing the PRNS, some closed residential areas, parks, and open areas are not include on the network limiting the PRNS application. In conclusion the PRNS is a useful application in order to assist pedestrians on their wayfinding in the city of Lund. It is also intended to help further development of new PRNS such as mobile PRNS applications. However, the PRNS must be improved and the dataset network requires updating and expansion for successful operations of the PRNS applications.Navigeringstjänster blir allt mer populära, men även om det finns en betydande mängd tjänster, finns det fortfarande begränsningar, speciellt för fotgängare. Fotgängare gör dagligen flera val om hur de ska hitta den bästa vägen i sin närmiljö. Att utveckla en navigeringstjänst för gående (PRNS) involverar flera viktiga faktorer. I denna studie analyseras flera befintliga nättjänster och studien visar att geografiska data är en av de viktigaste faktorerna för att utveckla egna PRNS. Två olika datamängder för PRNS utvärderades: OpenStreetMap (OSM) och svenska nationella vägdatabasen (NVDB). Efter en första utvärdering av de två datamängderna valdes OSM som visade sig ha flera fördelar för en fotgängares navigering. Implementeringen av en egen navigeringstjänst för gående är avsedd att underlätta utvecklingen av nya PRNS och analysering och jämförelsen av andra befintliga PRNS. pqRouting och PostgreSQL beräknar och samlar in de rutter som ska användas, med hjälp av datamängden som finns i databasen PostGIS. Topologin för nätverket i datamängden är relaterat till avstånden och fotgängaren bestämmer vägvalet. Geografiska informationssystem (GIS) är också en grundläggande faktor som används i den här studien för att analysera resultatet. PRNS implementerades i staden Lund och syftet är att underlätta för fotgängare att navigera i staden. En av begränsningarna vid utvecklandet av PRNS är bristen på dokumentation av vissa nya funktionaliteter i pgRouting. Även om OSM tillhandahåller ett grundläggande nätverk av vägar för utvecklingen av PRNS, så saknas information om vissa bostadsområden, parker och allmänna utrymmen, vilket begränsar PRNS. Sammanfattningsvis så är PRNS ett användbart program för att hjälpa fotgängare att välja väg i staden Lund. Vidare utveckling av PRNS kan exempelvis vara en mobilapplikation. Då måste dock PRNS förbättras och datamängden kräver uppdatering och utveckling för att bli framgångsrik.Internet based applications for finding shortest ways to travel are becoming increasingly popular. However, although there are significant amount of these applications there are still limitations especially for pedestrian. Developing an internet based application service for pedestrian involves several steps. During this study the analysis of several internet based applications service for pedestrian have demonstrated that the geographical data is one of the most important components in order to develop the PRNS. Two different dataset were evaluated OpenStreetMap (OSM) and Swedish national road database (NVDB). The use of the OSM dataset for developing the PRNS was made after the comparison between both the dataset. OSM has shown more advantages in terms of completeness of roads network and ways for pedestrian than NVDB. The OSM dataset was created and stored in a database called PostGIS. The calculation of distances and collection of the shortest ways to be displayed for the user are performed by extended tools and programs within PostGIS such as pgRouting and PostgreSQL respectively. The distance and determination of the shortest ways to walk is based on the structure of the dataset and the user choice. Thus, application such as Geographical Information System (GIS) is also one fundamental component used in this study, for example, to evaluate and create maps for visual analysis. One of the limitations developing the PRNS is the lack of documentation for new functions which are released by developers. Some closed residential areas, parks, and open areas are not included on the network limiting the PRNS application. In conclusion the PRNS is a useful application in order to assist pedestrians on their wayfinding in the city of Lund. It is also intended to help further development of new PRNS such as mobile PRNS applications. However, the PRNS must be improved and the dataset network requires updating and expansion for successful operations of the PRNS applications

On the right track : comfort and confusion in indoor environments

Indoor navigation systems are not well adapted to the needs of their users. The route planning algorithms implemented in these systems are usually limited to shortest path calculations or derivatives, minimalizing Euclidian distance. Guiding people along routes that adhere better to their cognitive processes could ease wayfinding in indoor environments. This paper examines comfort and confusion perception during wayfinding by applying a mixed-method approach. The aforementioned method combined an exploratory focus group and a video-based online survey. From the discussions in the focus group, it could be concluded that indoor wayfinding must be considered at different levels: the local level and the global level. In the online survey, the focus was limited to the local level, i.e., local environmental characteristics. In this online study, the comfort and confusion ratings of multiple indoor navigation situations were analyzed. In general, the results indicate that open spaces and stairs need to be taken into account in the development of a more cognitively-sounding route planning algorithm. Implementing the results in a route planning algorithm could be a valuable improvement of indoor navigation support

Indoor Semantic Modelling for Routing:

Humans perform many activities indoors and they show a growing need for indoor navigation, especially in unfamiliar buildings such as airports, museums and hospitals. Complexity of such buildings poses many challenges for building managers and visitors. Indoor navigation services play an important role in supporting these indoor activities. Indoor navigation covers extensive topics such as: 1) indoor positioning and localization; 2) indoor space representation for navigation model generation; 3) indoor routing computation; 4) human wayfinding behaviours; and 5) indoor guidance (e.g., textual directories). So far, a large number of studies of pedestrian indoor navigation have presented diverse navigation models and routing algorithms/methods. However, the major challenge is rarely referred to: how to represent the complex indoor environment for pedestrians and conduct routing according to the different roles and sizes of users. Such complex buildings contain irregular shapes, large open spaces, complicated obstacles and different types of passages. A navigation model can be very complicated if the indoors are accurately represented. Although most research demonstrates feasible indoor navigation models and related routing methods in regular buildings, the focus is still on a general navigation model for pedestrians who are simplified as circles. In fact, pedestrians represent different sizes, motion abilities and preferences (e.g., described in user profiles), which should be reflected in navigation models and be considered for indoor routing (e.g., relevant Spaces of Interest and Points of Interest). In order to address this challenge, this thesis proposes an innovative indoor modelling and routing approach – two-level routing. It specially targets the case of routing in complex buildings for distinct users. The conceptual (first) level uses general free indoor spaces: this is represented by the logical network whose nodes represent the spaces and edges stand for their connectivity; the detailed (second) level focuses on transition spaces such as openings and Spaces of Interest (SOI), and geometric networks are generated regarding these spaces. Nodes of a geometric network refers to locations of doors, windows and subspaces (SOIs) inside of the larger spaces; and the edges represent detailed paths among these geometric nodes. A combination of the two levels can represent complex buildings in specified spaces, which avoids maintaining a largescale complete network. User preferences on ordered SOIs are considered in routing on the logical network, and preferences on ordered Points of Interest (POI) are adopted in routing on geometric networks. In a geometric network, accessible obstacle-avoiding paths can be computed for users with different sizes. To facilitate automatic generation of the two types of network in any building, a new data model named Indoor Navigation Space Model (INSM) is proposed to store connectivity, semantics and geometry of indoor spaces for buildings. Abundant semantics of building components are designed in INSM based on navigational functionalities, such as VerticalUnit(VU) and HorizontalConnector(HC) as vertical and horizontal passages for pedestrians. The INSM supports different subdivision ways of a building in which indoor spaces can be assigned proper semantics. A logical and geometric network can be automatically derived from INSM, and they can be used individually or together for indoor routing. Thus, different routing options are designed. Paths can be provided by using either the logical network when some users are satisfied with a rough description of the path (e.g., the name of spaces), or a geometric path is automatically computed for a user who needs only a detailed path which shows how obstacles can be avoided. The two-level routing approach integrates both logical and geometric networks to obtain paths, when a user provides her/his preferences on SOIs and POIs. For example, routing results for the logical network can exclude unrelated spaces and then derive geometric paths more efficiently. In this thesis, two options are proposed for routing just on the logical network, three options are proposed for routing just on the geometric networks, and seven options for two-level routing. On the logical network, six routing criteria are proposed and three human wayfinding strategies are adopted to simulate human indoor behaviours. According to a specific criterion, space semantics of logical nodes is utilized to assign different weights to logical nodes and edges. Therefore, routing on the logical network can be accomplished by applying the Dijkstra algorithm. If multiple criteria are adopted, an order of criteria is applied for routing according to a specific user. In this way, logical paths can be computed as a sequence of indoor spaces with clear semantics. On geometric networks, this thesis proposes a new routing method to provide detailed paths avoiding indoor obstacles with respect to pedestrian sizes. This method allows geometric networks to be derived for individual users with different sizes for any specified spaces. To demonstrate the use of the two types of network, this thesis tests routing on one level (the logical or the geometric network). Four case studies about the logical network are presented in both simple and complex buildings. In the simple building, no multiple paths lie between spaces A and B, but in the complex buildings, multiple logical paths exist and the candidate paths can be reduced by applying these routing criteria in an order for a user. The relationships of these criteria to user profiles are assumed in this thesis. The proposed geometric routing regarding user sizes is tested with three case studies: 1) routing for pedestrians with two distinct sizes in one space; 2) routing for pedestrians with changed sizes in one space; and 3) a larger geometric network formed by the ones in a given sequence of spaces. The first case shows that a small increase of user size can largely change the accessible path; the second case shows different path segments for distinct sizes can be combined into one geometric path; the third case demonstrates a geometric network can be created ’on the fly’ for any specified spaces of a building. Therefore, the generation and routing of geometric networks are very flexible and fit to given users. To demonstrate the proposed two-level routing approach, this thesis designs five cases. The five cases are distinguished according to the method of model creation (pre-computed or ’on-the-fly’) and model storage (on the client or server). Two of them are realized in this thesis: 1) Case 1 just in the client pre-computes the logical network and derives geometric networks ’on the fly’; 2) Case 2 just in the client pre-computes and stores the logical and geometric networks for certain user sizes. Case 1 is implemented in a desktop application for building managers, and Case 2 is realized as a mobile mock-up for mobile users without an internet connection. As this thesis shows, two-level routing is powerful enough to effectively provide indicative logical paths and/or comprehensive geometric paths, according to different user requirements on path details. In the desktop application, three of the proposed routing options for two-level routing are tested for the simple OTB building and the complex Schiphol Airport building. These use cases demonstrate that the two-level routing approach includes the following merits: It supports routing in different abstraction forms of a building. The INSM model can describe different subdivision results of a building, and it allows two types of routing network to be derived – pure logical and geometric ones. The logical network contains the topology and semantics of indoor spaces, and the geometric network provides accurate geometry for paths. A consistent navigation model is formed with the two networks, i.e., the conceptual and detailed levels. On the conceptual level, it supports routing on a logical network and assists the derivation of a conceptual path (i.e., logical path) for a user in terms of space sequence. Routing criteria are designed based on the INSM semantics of spaces, which can generate logical paths similar to human wayfinding results such as minimizing VerticalUnit or HorizontalConnector. On the detailed level, it considers the size of users and results in obstacle-avoiding paths. By using this approach, geometric networks can be generated to avoid obstacles for the given users and accessible paths are flexibly provided for user demands. This approach can process changes of user size more efficiently, in contrast to routing on a complete geometric network. It supports routing on both the logical and the geometric networks, which can generate geometric paths based on user-specific logical paths, or re-compute logical paths when geometric paths are inaccessible. This computation method is very useful for complex buildings. The two-level routing approach can flexibly provide logical and geometric paths according to user preferences and sizes, and can adjust the generated paths in limited time. Based on the two-level routing approach, this thesis also provides a vision on possible cooperation with other methods. A potential direction is to design more routing options according to other indoor scenarios and user preferences. Extensions of the two-level routing approach, such as other types of semantics, multi-level networks and dynamic obstacles, will make it possible to deal with other routing cases. Last but not least, it is also promising to explore its relationships with indoor guidance, different building subdivisions and outdoor navigation

A tool for signage placement recommendation in hospitals based on wayfinding metrics

Navigating a healthcare facility can prove challenging to both new and existing patients and visitors. Poor or ineffective use of signage within the facility may enhance navigational difficulties. Signage strategies within facility design tend to be produced without consideration of how people typically navigate a space. Thus, strategies that ‘work on paper’ may not, in reality, aid or optimize patient and visitor wayfinding. Existing strategies for determining signage placement may also prove costly in terms of time spent on manual analysis of a facility’s floor space, including the potential for overlooking prime signage locations when analysing large floor plans. This paper presents a tool which aims to aid signage placement strategies by analysing facility design and routes within it, based on natural wayfinding metrics found in existing literature. The tool is designed to enable quick analysis of large designs for analysing multiple routes, highlighting areas where signage placement would aid natural wayfinding. The outputs of the tool are presented as a colour map which overlays the original 3D model design, highlighting the key areas where signage may be appropriate. An example of how the tool can be utilised to aid effective sign strategy is demonstrated on a small healthcare facility design