A highly developed digital infrastructure is a prerequisite for well-functioning transport.
A highly developed digital infrastructure is a prerequisite for well-functioning transport. The strong cooperation between Väylävirasto (Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency, FTIA) and Sitowise continues under a five-year agreement on the operation of Väylävirasto’s digital Geographic Information Services.
In Finland, the maintenance and development of the state’s transport network, that is, roads, railways and, to a large extent, waterways, is the responsibility of Väylävirasto. Väylävirasto manages, uses and distributes large amounts of data related to the transport network and traffic.
Information on the location, characteristics and condition of routes, as well as traffic volumes and key figures for the transport system are guiding the planning and monitoring of the transport network and provide support for decision-making.
In addition to Väylävirasto’s own experts, these data resources are used by other parties operating in the public sector, by companies and also by ordinary citizens.
As a result of the competitive bidding process that took place at the end of 2018, Sitowise Oy was selected as the operator of Väylävirasto’s Geographic Information Services for the next five years. The value of the agreement is EUR 2.75 million. Sitowise was responsible for the service operations in the past agreement period as well.
"The five-year agreement will allow us to continue our strong cooperation and the long-term development of Väylävirasto’s services related to IT and geographic information in a sustainable manner. Being responsible for such a wide range of services is an honour for us," says Milla Lötjönen, Director, Digital Services at Sitowise.
With the digitalisation of transport services, the need for up-to-date data and geographic information services is also increasing. Geographic information services play a key role as a service provider for shared services. Väylävirasto aims to further strengthen this role.
In the near future, it will be of increasing importance that the needs of the users of Geographic Information Services and the systems that utilise them are mapped in more detail and predicted better. One already identified customer need is related to the quality of data.
Matti Pesu, Development Manager at Väylävirasto
The objective is to be able to provide, with increasingly improved quality, the most important centralised applications and services that practically all information systems utilising geographical information need.
“In the near future, it will be of increasing importance that the needs of the users of Geographic Information Services and the systems that utilise them are mapped in more detail and predicted better. One already identified customer need is related to the quality of data. Transport is being automated and will be a large-scale consumer of all data provided by Väylävirasto, and any previously undiscovered data errors will be revealed without mercy. For this reason, it will be necessary to develop data quality audits, validation, automatic corrections and feedback processes," says Matti Pesu, Development Manager at Väylävirasto.
Among other things, the interface and download services for the open data provided by Väylä are produced as a part of Geographic Information Services. Through the service, data resources related to road, rail and waterway networks are available openly to all citizens.
The download and viewing service enables you to view the data in a map view and download any materials you want on your computer to be used, for example, by design and geographic information software.
The service implementation is based on the open source Oskari technology, of which Sitowise has long experience.
The entire Geographic Information Service package of Väylävirasto involves a wide variety of work related to data storage and transfer, the development of applications and services and professional services.
The more than 200 data sets include a wide variety of information, such as data on railway level crossings, maritime security equipment and, for the road network, data on public transport stops and noise prevention structures.
The entire Geographic Information Service package of Väylävirasto involves a wide variety of work related to data storage and transfer, the development of applications and services and professional services.