Knowledge-based engineering in the context of railway design by integrating BIM, BPMN, DMN and the methodology for knowledge-based engineering applications (MOKA)

Designing railway infrastructure is a knowledge-intensive task. Although there are a number of mature design authoring systems available, their support for dynamically incorporating domain-specific engineering knowledge is very limited. At the same time, a standardized digital representation of railway engineering knowledge (such as building codes and best practice) does not exists. To overcome this deficiency, this paper proposes the use of Knowledge Based Engineering (KBE) to automate routine design tasks by considering multiple knowledge sources. In this scenario, KBE is used to support a Railway design authoring system. To ensure maximum transparency in the design of the developed KBE application, graphical ‘Business Process Model and Notation’ (BPMN) has been used in combination with ‘Decision Model and Notation’ (DMN) to formalize the underlying engineering knowledge. The KBE application has been developed according to the Methodology for Knowledge-Based Engineering Applications (MOKA). An evaluation of the BPMN/DMN approach shows that it meets up to 58% of the acceptance criteria found in the literature. In addition, BPMN and DMN can already be used in the early capture phase of MOKA and its workflows can be developed into an executable KBE application in the subsequent phases. The results of the test example discussed here show that time savings of up to 97.5% can be achieved in the execution of the KBE application.