Database For Outstanding Tunnel Projects

R.M. Faure Centre dtude des tunnels A. Robert Centre d'tude des tunnels J.F. Thimus Universit Catholique de Louvain W. Schubert Universit de Graz E. Bourgeois LCPC A.P. Bois AmsaTec ABSTRACT: The first releas e of the KBT project (Knowledge Base about Tunnel) is described here, showing its functions and its ambitions. It provides an international system for setting, collecting and exchanging all kind of data about tunnels. Data is divided into meta-data and data. The first one is stored in an usual data base that allows queries, the second one is stored in unformatted form, giving the possibility of storing any kind of data, like a numerical file for example. The project is developed in three mirror-sites, and the exchange system allows controlling the diffusion of data, that is called semi-confidentiality. The tools provided by KBT can be also used for the storage of the memory of a department/service.

1 INTRODUCTION One of the main activities of AFTES (French representative of the AITES) is to study how to manage tunnels from their design and construction to their exploitation. However, managing a tunnel project is a tricky task due mainly to incomplete geological, technological and logistic knowledge. It appears that company reorganizations tend to push engineers not to spend their entire life on the same technical subject but to become more generalist, aware of everything, but specialist in nothing. Moreover, most projects must be designed and realized in very short period that inhibits any long-term effort. Many researchers, consultants and specialists have tried to find solutions to this problem, one of the alternative being the use of expert systems to help the engineers in their decisions. Unfortunately, this alternative was not successful due to the complex protocol prescribed i f substantial solutions had to be reached. In an open world as the world of Civil engineering is (open should be understood in the context of artificial intelligence where it means that the knowledgebase is always incomplete), the classical approach

of expert systems cannot succeed. It is then necessary to follow other alternatives, such as the analogue-based analysis, which requires the creation of analogue-bases. ENTPE (France) and University Laval at Qubec (Canada) worked together on the XPENT project (Faure et al., 1992) that aimed at designing and implementing an expert system in the field of slope stability. At the end of the project, they concluded that the acquisition of the expert rules requires the use of analogue-based analysis and consequently of a large slope instability data base, where one can find well documented cases on any type of stability problem. Such a conclusion is also valid for tunnels. The development of an analogue-base will help in making the knowledge circulating between engineers who will have more than one job in their life. The KBT (Knowledge Base about Tunnels) is a first attempt to create such an analogue-base and its internationalisation d erives directly from the international nature of the projects and from the existence of the information technology networks. This paper presents the bases of this project.

2 REQUIREMENTS OF A TUNNEL ANALOGUE-BASE Expert systems have always included an analogue-base to define the expert rules. This analogue-base is necessary to support the analogue-based analysis, which is the analysis method of most experts, and whose simulation through software is intended to guide project managers. However, tunnels are very complex objects for which description is not simple and varies from specialists to specialists, depending on their background, their culture and their knowledge. Hence, a geologist will not see a tunnel in the same way as a geotechnician does. While both can be right in their analyses, a tunnel cannot be designed with the only approach of a geologist or of a geotechnician, but by looking at the tunnel as a whole. One difficulty of such an approach is that there cannot be one description, one vision, one classification (a classification is a way to see an object) when more than one field is related to the object. As a consequence, there are many different tunnel classifications in the literature depending on: The tunnel function (road, railway, water in charge, etc.) which can change with time; The geologist view according to which a tunnel is a succession of geological sections; The structural engineer view according to which a tunnel is made of supports, linings, typical cross-sections, etc, a view that evolves with the techniques; The geotechnician view; Etc. The fact that most classifications can change with time confirms the advantage of an analogue-base as such a base can capture the historic nature of the tunnel description. Unfortunately, it is not sufficient to classify a tunnel to describe it, and one has also to provide information on the designing parameters, to provide photographs, cross -sections, drawings, etc. This should be looked at under two aspects: The aspect of the information techno logies, due to the importance and of the formats of the data to be stored; The aspects of interface between the user (the human) and the machine, which should be as friendly as possible. However, this should also be looked at under the view of the researcher, of the owner, and of the creator of the data, a view that implies the aspects of ownership and confidentiality that are against free and uncontrolled data diffusion. More practically, the functioning of a tunnel analogue-base can be illustrated properly by the following questions:

Who has not wished to possess a database where he can find all information concerning tunnel projects that are alike the one he is currently working on? Who has not wanted to store some of his knowledge in terms of tunnel, for himself, or for others not to develop again this knowledge from the beginning? Who has not tried to remember the problems solved during the design or the construction of a given tunnel, that where described in a report that nobody can ever localize? How can a tunnel be described, taking its intrinsic and constructive complexities into account, to be able to capture the essential without any lost? How can we not lose too much time in the information input, how can we input only important data, without being lost in too rigid formats? How can we exchange information, how can we have access to our colleague information, even if they are stored in another language? How can we control the information flux to profit only to our colleagues while making the other h ungry? How can we mix texts, sketches, images, in an easy and efficient way? How can we use documentation services to go even further and faster? All this proves the need of a real analogue-base, and not only of a simple database, to store data, methodologies and know-how, that is knowledge. The next parts of this paper will show that it is possible to perform this while following some simple concepts. 3 THE CONCEPTS Three concepts are at the core of KBT: 1st concept The localization in space Each tunnel is localized on the earth and is associated to some geographical coordinates. It can be viewed on a map as an icon. That is, one is able to have a geographical view of the tunnels stored in the analogue-base. The use of more than one icon per tunnel, depending on the type of information to be stored, creates a visualized classification (Faure et al., 1998). As an example, an icon can be used to describe the tunnel function, while another one can be used to describe the tunnel shape. The geographical frame selected in KBT is WGS, but other can be defined directly by the users. 2nd concept Data and meta-data

In the artificial intelligence world, the Meta prefix means an extra abstraction level. A meta-rule is a rule to manipulate rules, and here a meta-data is a data on data. To know that a data exists, to know where it is, who has it, is a meta-data (Faure et al., 1999). The power of the meta-data concept is that it is a major characteristics of the information that we want to store and manage (most often one knows more meta-data than he knows data). Moreover, it allows to by-pass the problem of semi-confidentiality. 3rd concept Semi-confidentiality Humans like to show what they have, but do not like to give it to somebody they do not know. They want to keep control on the diffusion of their data (Faure, 1999). Data and meta-data are managed in a different w a y i n K B T . M e t a-d a t a a r e s t o r e d i n a conventional database, while data are stored unformatted in HTML pages, linked to the metadata. Semi-confidentiality is then performed by only diffusing meta-data, while data are stored in their creator analogue-base and transferred only on demand. Technically, this implies a three-level architecture. 4 A THREE-LEVEL ARCHITECTURE 1st level is the level of the user (engineer, geologist, etc.) who can be connected to a local analogue-base (level 2) located on his intranet. For such he must load a user application software down to his desktop. The user can also be connected to the third level of the architecture through Internet. 2nd level is the level of the company or of the university (full company, service, department, etc.). It is a local analogue-base located on the intranet server, in which all analogue cases managed by the company or the university are stored, be them complete or not. Safety is provided through passwords. The Intranet network is linked to Internet, and the local analogue-base can contain cases duplicated from the third level. Various queries are available. 3rd l e v e l i s t h e l e v e l o f t h e g l o b a l analogue-bases that are located in three (a number that can be modified) server sites in mirror. This means that the information is exactly the same in the three sites. A user sends the cases he has selected from his own local analogue-base to the level three global analogue-base, the cases being complete or containing only meta-data (Figure 1). This user is also able to select cases in the global analogue-base and to download them in his/her own local analogue-base, where he is able to manipulate them. The three third-level

sites contain a collection of international cases that one can consult and copy. 5 PROPOSED SOLUTION The proposed solution follows the above concepts and answers to the questions asked in the following way: The complex object (tunnel) management is possible because of the distinction between data (maps, sketches, calculus reports, field reports, etc.) and meta -data that aim at describing the available information (Figure 2). The three level architecture allows to satisfy the semi-confidentiality and to filter the authorized users of an information. The three levels are in network through the use of Intranets and Internet while using classical controls. The user-friendly software (Figures 2 and 3), which uses drop down menus, buttons, icons and a geographical viewer (Figure 4) that is in agreement with map copyrights, is simple to use while the learning curve is fast. Interface customisation is a must that each department will appreciate in function of its objectives. The use of tables that contains pre-defined words in various languages allows an international exchange of meta-data. KBT is the interface software of this project. 6 DESCRIPTION OF THE THREE LEVELS 1st level The desktop It is the user desktop, by which the user can, through his intranet, be in contact with his local analogue-base, and store in it new analogue cases. The user can also, through the Internet, consult the global analogue-base and down load some information. 2nd level The company, the university The interface software is loaded from one of the international site (level three). It is user adaptable in term of screen image, of localization maps, and of icons. These objects are not transferred through Internet, be it from level two to level three, or the opposite. Entering one tunnel case at a user desk consists in setting three icons from a series of fifteen on a map (at any scale as there is not one map but a full tree of maps at different scales to allow one to zoom as desired) and to validate. This validation leads to a specific screen where one can fill the subjects through drop -down and empty cells or through buttons. Then one has to fill the HTML addresses associated to the stored documents. These documents can be stored in a special

directory before, or after entering the case in the analogue-base. Analogue-base requests are performed through a SQL language for the database or through an Altavista type of software for the HTML pages. Safety is ensured by the Intranet safety system because there are no permanent communication with level 3, that is, with the outside. When a user decides that one tunnel case is suitable for diffusion, he connects himself through internet to a level 3 site, and give the names of the files to be transferred, and disconnects after transfer is finished. 3rd level The international servers Three international servers are planned in a mirror; that is, any information is the same in all three sites. This allows an easy and permanent access to the information (Figure 5). AFTES will be one of the servers, UCL at Louvain (Belgium) another one and the third could be at TU Graz (Austria). These server sites contain the cases transferred by level-two users be they complete or incomplete cases depending on the wills of their creators. Safety in writing is provided through passwords, while no specific system exists in reading. 7 CONCLUSION KBT is an attempt to share knowledge concerning tunnels. Its success will depend on its use. If all geotechnicians or geologists create and transfer only one case a year, this will result into an efficient tunnel world analogue-base, that is of a memory of what is actually spread out all around the world. At the company level, this is an efficient way to manage knowledge at a time when it is often difficu lt to manage it due to staff mobility. This is possible because companies have then the entire power to control the diffusion of their knowledge. This approach will also be fruitful for teaching when the need of real cases to be displayed is obvious. It is why the WG17 of AITES (teaching) will follow the development of KBT. And this concept, is not only a tunnel data concept as it can be applied to any type of knowledge (Faure 2001).

For more information see on www.amsatec.com 8 CONTACTS rene-michel.faure@equipement.gouv.fr alain-alex.robert@equipement.gouv.fr thimus@gce.ucl.ac.be schubert@fmt.tu-graz.ac.at bourgeois@lcpc.fr apbois@amsatec.com 9 AKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors wish to acknowledge Mr. Abdelkader Maghraoui who has programmed the KBT first version 10 REFERENCES Faure R.M., Mascarelli D., Vaunat J., Leroueil S., Tavenas F.; 1992, Present state of development of XPENT, expert system for slopes stability problems. 6th Int. Congress on Landslides Bell editor Christchurch. p1671-1678 Faure R.M., Tailhan J., Cligniez V., G a n d o n B . , 1 9 9 8 , P r s e n tation de lobservatoire de Schilienne. Revue Internationale de gomatique. vol 8 n3, pp 47-57, Herms ed. Faure R.M., Maghraoui A., 1999, Some ideas and a tool for exchanging complex ground data. 21st Urban Data Management Symposium, Venice Faure Ren-Michel, 1999, Databases and the management of landslides. Int. Symp. on landslides. Shikoku (Japan). p13171330 Faure R.M., 2001, Base de donnes Internationale sur les glissements de terrain, Revue Franaise de Gotechnique. Numro spcial: Mouvements de terrain. Ho Chun Pong, 2001, Base de connaissance sur les tunnels, Mmoire de fin dtudes, Universit Catholique de Louvain. 120p

APPENDIX

KBT - Meta data

Rfrences de l'ouvrage:
Nom de l'ouvrage : Lieu, pays : Numro DICOS : Date de saisie : Date mise en service : Coordonnes WGS dbut Ouvrage Coordonnes WGS fin Ouvrage : Itinraire : Type de voie : Longueur ouvrage : Oprateur : Gestionaire : Rfrence Dossier : Commentaire : Mtro de Lille ligne2, section F France, Lille 02/02/01 : X1= E31'53'' Y1= N5039'50'' X2= Y2= Mtro 2100 m CETu1 Travaux n720

Caractristiques de l'ouvrage:
. Tte 1 Gologie . Lithologie . Dblai . Ex trmit tube Renforcement Front d'attaque . . . Etanchit Structure . .

Gologie Lithologie Creusement

Couverture Rc moyen PM Soutnement Revtement moyenne Anomalies (MPa) dbut (m) . . . . .

PM fin

Tronon1

Quaternaire

Silt

Bouclier voussoirs pression de bton boue

Tronon2

Bouclier voussoirs Tuffeaux pression de bton boue Argile . . . . . Bouclier voussoirs pression de bton boue . . . . . Lithologie . . . . . . Dblai .

Tronon3 Tronon4 Tronon5 Tron on6 Tronon7 Tronon8 . Tte2

. . . . . . Gologie .

. . . . . .

. . . . . .

. . . . . .

. . . . . .

. . . . . .

. . . . . .

Extrmit tube Renforcement Front d'attaque Etanchit Structure . . . . .

Elments de connaissance :
Nombre de tronon : Forme de la section : Section excave (m^2) Pente : Nombre de tubes : Structure interne : Etanchit : Protection incendie : 3 circulaire : 50 1

ne sait pas

Elments de connaissance complmentaires :

Plan de situation, descriptif: NON Coupe longitudinale: NON Coupe transversale: NON Rapport gologique : OUI Rapport gotechnique, hydrogologique : Note de calcul : NON Elments de cot : NON Autres lments : OUI

NON

Figure 1: HTML page example, which is created automatically from the meta-data and to which are linked unformatted data. Such an unformatted data is given here as an image. Underlined words allow to access to the unformatted data

Tunnel

Localisation et usage

Mta-donnes gotechniques et constructives

Principales donnes chiffres

Documents attachs

Tte 1

Tte 2

Tronon 1

Tronon 8

Figure 2: Meta-data structure

Figure 3: Input screen for meta-data in which five parts can be distinguished

Figure 4: Screen for tunnel localization, the small window being use to select the icon types

Figure 5: Level 3-access table