Frequently asked questions about Esri Roads and Highways

General questions

Roads and Highways for Desktop questions

Roads and Highways for Server questions

Roadway Characteristics Editor questions

Roads and Highways conflict prevention

Troubleshooting

Where can I get sample data to evaluate Roads and Highways?

The Roads and Highways community contains a download that has a sample dataset to use for evaluation based on the State of New York's LRS and Highway Performance Monitoring System (HPMS) event data.

Download Roads and Highways sample data.

Can I run Roads and Highways on a virtual machine?

Yes. It is important to ensure that the virtualized environment meets the minimum system requirements needed by Roads and Highways. In the case of local virtualization, or running a virtual machine player on a local machine (not a cloud), it's important to note that the minimum system requirements are what the emulated environment would need to provide to Roads and Highways. This is in addition to the virtualization environment's minimum system requirements to support the virtualization software.

How do I migrate my data to Roads and Highways?

The storage model for organizations looking to migrate to Roads and Highways is not the same for all: some have a spatial LRS with geometry, and some do not; some use the geodatabase, and some do not. The general steps to migrate are as follows:

  1. First, understand the Roads and Highways minimum schema for common centerline storage (two tables and two feature classes).

    For more information, see ALRS data model.

  2. Understand the data requirements for event data to map against a Roads and Highways LRS.

    For more information, see Registering an event by Route and Measure.

  3. You need to translate your LRS and centerline current storage model into these tables.

    This process is different for each organization. In some cases, where multiple linear referencing methods and networks need to be supported, centerline conflation may need to take place. Look at the LRMs your organization currently has and see if there are opportunities to consolidate and reduce the number of linear referencing methods and networks. If you can get your networks into an ArcGIS PolylineM feature class, there are scripts on the Roads and Highways community that can help with the migration.

    For more information, see the Roads and Highways community.

  4. Once the LRS data is migrated, configure the ALRS.

    For more information, see ALRS data model.

  5. Decide which event tables or data will be modeled in the geodatabase under the management of Roads and Highways, and then migrate these tables into the geodatabase and register them with the network they reference.

    For more information, see Registering an event by Route and Measure.

How do I configure the precision and scale for my measures in Roads and Highways?

The precision and scale for the networks comes from the settings on the measure column of the calibration point feature class. This information is propagated to each network.

The precision and scale for events comes from the settings on the From Measure and To Measure columns on the event feature class.

Where can I get the HPMS capabilities of Roads and Highways?

You can get them from the Roads and Highways community.

For more information, see the Roads and Highways community.

How do I upgrade my ALRS from the 10.2.2 version of Roads and Highways?

There is a context menu option in the Catalog window in ArcMap on the ALRS node of the geodatabase. Click the command to upgrade the ALRS and upgrade your event tables to event feature classes. The operation can take several minutes.

Once your ALRS has been upgraded, you will be presented with the option to enable conflict prevention in the ALRS, which is disabled by default. To learn more about conflict prevention, see Conflict prevention.

What are the minimum system requirements for Roads and Highways for Desktop?

The system requirements for Roads and Highways for Desktop include the system requirements for ArcGIS for Desktop. The memory (RAM), disk space, and processor power need to be adjusted based on the data volumes being worked with. For working with linear referencing data in Roads and Highways, it is recommended to at least double the minimum RAM requirements specified by ArcGIS for Desktop to allow for some of the memory requirements needed by Roads and Highways event measure behavior processing logic.

For more information, see the ArcGIS for Desktop system requirements.

Can I use the ArcGIS editing tools to edit centerlines in Roads and Highways for Desktop?

Yes, you can use ArcGIS editing tools to create and reshape centerlines.

However, in order to split, merge, and delete centerlines, you must use the tools provided on the Roads And Highways Editing toolbar. These tools ensure that the relationships the centerlines have with routes are honored after the operation and are not broken.

Can I use the core ArcGIS editing tools to directly edit Roads and Highways LRS Network routes?

No. Though the software doesn't prevent you from doing so, the routes in the LRS Network feature classes should never have their shape, route ID, from date, or to date directly edited. The edit activities (create route, extend route, retire route, realign route, and reassign route) on the Roads And Highways Editing toolbar should be used for making changes to routes in a network.

If you accidentally edit and save changes on a route or set of routes in an LRS Network, the change can be repaired using the Generate Routes geoprocessing tool or by right-clicking the LRS Network in the geodatabase in ArcCatalog and in the Catalog window in ArcMap and clicking Generate Routes.

For more information, see Generating routes.

Can I use the ArcGIS editing tools to directly edit Roads and Highways event feature classes?

Event feature classes (events modeled in the geodatabase and registered with Roads and Highways) are events that have a shape column managed by Roads and Highways. You should not edit event shapes. You can edit event attributes, route ID, from date, to date, and measures in the ArcMap attribute table, and Roads and Highways will take care of updating the shape. Roads and Highways for Server also provides REST services to support editing event feature classes in a manner that allows Roads and Highways to update the shape.

If you accidentally edit an event feature class shape and save the changes, Roads and Highways has a menu option in the Catalog window in ArcMap on the geodatabase for the LRS event node that is registered with Roads and Highways. Click Update Event Shapes to correct the shapes of the events.

For more information, see Updating event shapes.

Can I edit the same route in different geodatabase versions?

Though Roads and Highways does not prevent more than one user from editing the same route at the same time in different versions, this practice is discouraged. If two or more users edit the same route in different versions and attempt to post and reconcile into a common version, conflicts will be detected on the route feature class for the network and potentially other elements as well, such as the centerline feature class and event. Since Roads and Highways modifies event measures based on network edits in multiple event feature classes based on preconfigured rules, manual reconciliation of conflicts could be highly prone to error.

The recommended approach when this happens is for the second (and any other) user to refrain from posting and roll back the changes. Then accept the changes from the parent version and redo the edits.

Why do I get an Underlying DBMS error or ORA-01012: not logged on message when I resume my edit session?

This can happen when you are connected to Oracle from ArcMap and you have been idle for a while. By default, an Oracle database will time out an idle connection after 60 minutes of inactivity. This time-out may be more or less, depending on your Oracle configuration. Once an idle connection time-out has occurred, the Oracle database session is ended and an error message is displayed.

As a best practice, it is recommended that you save edits and stop editing prior to leaving an ArcMap session. However, if an error occurs, you can close ArcMap and reopen the MXD.

Can I use topology with Roads and Highways?

Yes, Roads and Highways supports creating and maintaining topology on your data in an ALRS. To create a topology, you must first put the feature classes that are to participate in the topology into a feature dataset in the geodatabase containing the ALRS.

If you have not created the minimum ALRS schema, create one and place the feature classes that will participate in a topology within the feature dataset you created. Typically, the calibration points, centerlines, and network feature classes would make sense to participate in a topology. For example, you could configure a topology rule to ensure networks or centerlines don't have dangles or a rule to ensure calibration points are always on centerlines.

Once you have the appropriate feature classes in a feature dataset, you can then create and validate the topology.

What are the minimum system requirements for Roads and Highways for Server?

The system requirements for Roads and Highways for Server include the system requirements for ArcGIS for Server; however, Roads and Highways for Server is only supported on Windows Server platforms (not Linux or UNIX).

The memory (RAM), disk space, and processor power need to be adjusted based on the data volumes being worked with. In addition, the number of machines in a cluster need to be scaled to handle the number of concurrent requests being requested from the deployment.

For working with linear referencing data in Roads and Highways, it is recommended to at least double the minimum RAM requirements specified by ArcGIS for Server to allow for some of the memory requirements needed by the ArcGIS event feature layer, if you are publishing external event tables in your map services.

For more information, see the ArcGIS for Server system requirements.

Can I cluster map services with the Roads and Highways for Server linear referencing capability?

Yes, but you must have Roads and Highways for Server installed and licensed on each machine participating in the cluster.

Is it possible to access the Roads and Highways geoprocessing tools on ArcGIS for Server?

Yes. To access the tools on ArcGIS for Server, the tools need to be published as part of a geoprocessing model. Refer to the toolbox located in the Esri Roads and Highways for Server installation directory for an example of how to build a model to incorporate the geoprocessing tools.

Map services with external event tables are slow. Is there any way to boost performance?

External events in Roads and Highways use the ArcGIS event feature layer. This layer locates events and draws them on a map at map request time. Though this feature is powerful and spatially enables data that does not maintain a shape, it is not as fast as a feature class. You may need to set your map scale dependencies so these layers only draw at certain scales.

In addition, make sure these tables have the route ID columns indexed. The ArcGIS event feature layers will query all events on all routes that intersect the map extent being viewed. Indexing allows the queries to execute faster.

Is it possible to edit external events in the Roadway Characteristics Editor?

Not directly. The Roadway Characteristics Editor was developed to edit the event data modeled in the geodatabase registered with Roads and Highways. The only way external event tables that are not modeled in the geodatabase can be edited from the Roadway Characteristics Editor is to create equivalent event feature classes in the geodatabase and register them with Roads and Highways. Event data could then be edited, but a process would need to be developed to move edited data from those event feature classes into the external event tables to provide the updates to the external system.

What browsers does the Roadway Characteristics Editor support?

  • Firefox
  • Google Chrome 4.0 or later
  • Internet Explorer 9
  • Safari 4.0 or later

Why can't I edit certain records or attributes in the Roadway Characteristics Editor?

If an event record's event ID field is <null>, you cannot edit the event in the Event Attributes grid. Also, the Object ID, Event ID, LocError, and ST_length fields are not editable.

For more information about the importance of event IDs when editing events, see the following:

Is conflict prevention mandatory for Roads and Highways?

No, conflict prevention is not mandatory. When you upgrade your 10.2.2 ALRS to the 10.2.2 Patch 1 version, conflict prevention will be disabled by default. You can change these settings in the ALRS properties. Conversely, you can choose to disable conflict prevention settings after it has been enabled in the ALRS. For more information about conflict prevention, see Conflict prevention in Roads and Highways for Desktop.

When I edit a route in Roads and Highways for Desktop, why am I prompted to acquire a route lock?

Conflict prevention settings for your ALRS are reflected when editing in desktop. If conflict prevention is enabled, you will be prompted to acquire locks when performing cartographic realignments, in all of the editing activities, editing calibration points, generating and updating intersections, and during event registration. To learn about the different conflict prevention scenarios, see Conflict prevention in Roads and Highways for Desktop.

When I edit an event in the Roadway Characteristics Editor, why am I prompted to acquire an event lock?

Conflict prevention settings in the ALRS will be reflected in your deployment of the Roadway Characteristics Editor (RCE). If conflict prevention is enabled, you will be prompted to acquire an event lock when you use any of the editing widgets in RCE. To learn more about conflict prevention in RCE, see Conflict prevention in the Roadway Characteristics Editor.

What are route locks and event locks?

Route locks are a capability in Roads and Highways conflict prevention that allow a user to prevent other users from editing a route and events on a route while the route is being edited. When a route is locked, only the user with the lock can edit the route and events on the route in the version the lock was acquired. To acquire a lock on a route, a user must first reconcile with the lock root version. To release a lock on a route, a user needs to post changes to the route and events on the route to the lock root version.

Event locks are a capability in Roads and Highways conflict prevention that allow a user to prevent other users from editing events for an event layer on a specific route. When events for an event layer on a route are locked, only the user with the lock can edit those events on the route in the version the lock was acquired. Other users may acquire event locks for the same route on a different event layer if needed. To acquire an event lock, a user must first reconcile with the lock root version. To release an event lock, the user needs to post changes to the locked events to the lock root version. If any event locks exist for a route, no users may edit the route until all event locks are released.

How do I release route or event locks someone else has created?

If the user who has acquired the locks is not available to release them, an administrator can choose to delete the version in which the locks were acquired. Once the version is deleted, all locks acquired in that version can be released by any user with Roads and Highways for Desktop.

Why do I get errors when publishing my map service with linear referencing capability?

There could be a number of reasons:

  • Ensure that Roads and Highways for Server is installed on all machines participating in the cluster hosting the map service with linear referencing capability.
  • Ensure that any Roads and Highways for Server licenses haven’t expired and that the ArcGIS for Server licenses haven’t expired.
  • Ensure that Roads and Highways for Server is licensed on all the machines participating in the cluster hosting the map service with linear referencing capability.

What do I do if I accidentally edit my event feature class shapes directly and save the changes?

If you accidentally edit an event feature class shape and save the changes, Roads and Highways has a command in the Catalog window in ArcMap on the geodatabase for the LRS event node that is registered with Roads and Highways. Click Update Event Shapes to correct the shapes of the events.

For more information, see Updating event shapes.

What do I do if I accidentally edit my routes in an LRS Network without using the Roads And Highways Editing toolbar?

If you accidentally edit and save changes on a route or set of routes in an LRS Network, the change can be repaired by using the Generate Routes geoprocessing tool or by right-clicking the LRS Network in the geodatabase in ArcCatalog and in the Catalog window in ArcMap and clicking Generate Routes.

For more information, see Generating routes.

My web map, a map service with linear referencing capability, will not load in the Roadway Characteristics Editor. What should I do?

There could be a number of causes:

  • Ensure the web map is published as public on ArcGIS.com.
  • Ensure the map service with linear referencing capability is running on ArcGIS for Server.
  • Ensure Roads and Highways for Server is installed on all machines in the ArcGIS for Server cluster hosting the map services with linear referencing capability.
  • Ensure the Roadway Characteristics Editor config.json file is properly formatted (compare it in a file compare tool with the original version to ensure the JSON syntax didn’t get corrected).
  • Ensure the web map configuration in the config.json file is pointing to the correct web map.

Why doesn't redlining work in the Roadway Characteristics Editor?

Ensure that m and z support is not enabled on the Redline feature class and that the map services with linear referencing capability have feature service capability enabled.

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10/14/2014