Information Exchange between GIS and Geospatial ITS Databases Based on a Generic Model

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper focused on the interoperability between GIS and geodatabases for ITS. The authors reviewed different existing solutions/standards in the domain, and evaluated them from different aspects. Based on the findings, they proposed a new generic model for the exchange of road-related geospatial information. The author introduced their model in detail and did a case study as the validation. This paper is very informative, and I enjoyed reading it very well. The paper is in a good shape, the only comment I have is about the review part (Section 3.1). The whole section is more like a literature review, it is better to present this in the introduction section before the discussion of research questions. Besides this, I recommend the publication.

Author Response

First, thank you for all your efforts and constructive suggestions!  We follow most of your suggestions to make this revised manuscript clearer and more readable. All changes are indicated in the revision with changing tracking version.  Our answers are further described in the attached document.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

I find this submission very interesting and within the scope of the journal. The submission addresses the topic of exchanging data between Geographic information systems and intelligent transport systems. This is particularly relevant on the wake of the plans of the European union to develop a universal system for trip planning. Similar studies have been reported on the topic but i find this one particularly complete.

The submission is written in a clear way and the flow of topics is very logic. 

The abstract is clear and the conclusions are based on the results that were found. Furthermore I think the the article provides a very useful and synthetic summary of applicable standards.

The article provides very useful summary tables and is very well illustrated (need to improve image quality).

Please see a few comments below on topics where I suggest some improvement:

- It would be interesting to give two or three examples on how data is currently exchanged and the problems that that creates.

- It is important to have more details on how the search was performed and then how were the articles selected.

- It is important to present two or three use cases. The authors present a case study and that is great but it would very useful to also provide some specific examples of practical applications such as public transportation, logistics, etc.

- Figure 5 not referred in the text.

- Improve quality of figures 4 - 7 (especially 6) as they are very difficult to read and are very important for a better understanding of the text.

Author Response

First, thank you for all your efforts and constructive suggestions!  We follow most of your suggestions to make this revised manuscript clearer and more readable. All changes are indicated in the revision with changing tracking version.  Our answers are further described in the attached document.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Based on manuscript review I would have the following suggestions / comments / questions: 

1. Title: avoid using the acronyms, e.g. ITS, since not every body may be familiar with them.

2. Abstract: explain GDF and specify a prototype, is it a prototype of a software solution, prototype of an information exchange model, etc.

3. Introduction: correct INSPIRE specification to Transport Networks to INSPIRE data specification on Transport Networks. I would suggest removing "that will be answered" from the research question identification, I found it quite strong to claim existence of its answers and thus quite unneeded to be highlighted already in the Introduction section. 

4. Why section 3. Results starts already within the section 2 Material and Methods? Based on the research objectives the result should describe a prototype of information exchange model and its verification by a pilot scenario, hence I would suggest you move the section 3 to current 3.2 where you actually start describing the results. All sections before 3.2 are correctly describing the materials you have used as inputs to your research method.  Sections from 3.2 including the section 4 should be aggregated into the common result section 3.

5. The Case Study section nicely describes the outputs of the workflow to harmonise the data between GDF and INSPIRE TN. I lack a description of its application on a real-life user scenario, which at the time before the prototype was developed could not be achieved due the data heterogeneity and other problems, but now it can be achieved. Could you describe such a use case? It would make your research added values more understandable by wider communities not only theoretical but also practical geoinformationists.

6. Section 4 describes XML code snippets of GML files for data files created for the case study: TransportNetworks.gml; GDF.gml and Network.gml. Are these data files online available? If not and if possible I would suggest to provide publicly available URL addresses to allow readers putting hands on authors case study outputs.  

I strongly recommend authors to elaborate mainly on point 5 before the final submission.

Author Response

First, thank you for all your efforts and constructive suggestions!  We follow most of your suggestions to make this revised manuscript clearer and more readable. All changes are indicated in the revision with changing tracking version.  Our answers are further described in the attached document.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf