Waypoint Routes (Transportation and Network Optimization)

Cosmic Frog users can now visualize routes from Hopper (transportation optimization) and Neo (network optimization) on real road networks instead of straight lines. Valhalla, an open-source routing engine for OpenStreetMap, is used to calculate the waypoints.

This guide assumes familiarity with how to configure maps and their layers in Cosmic Frog. See the Getting Started with Maps help center article for the basics.

Quick Start

1. Add or select a map layer
2. Choose a table name:
   1. TransportationRouteMapLayer (Hopper), or
   2. OptimizationFlowSummaryRoutes (Neo)
3. Turn on the "Waypoint Routes" toggle
4. Click "Generate Routes"
5. Monitor progress in the Model Activity panel
6. View updated routes on the map

Why it Matters

• Realistic visualization: Understand how flows move along actual roads instead of straight lines
• Better analysis: Identify inefficiencies, and route overlap
• Improved communication: Stakeholders can better interpret results with familiar road-based visuals
• Scalable insights: Works across thousands of routes with clear progress tracking

How to Configure

There are 2 tables available in the Table Name drop-down on the Condition Builder panel of a map layer for which waypoint routes can be generated:

• TransportationRoutesMapLayer for Hopper - requires the TransportationSegmentSummary table to contain outputs for the scenario the map is currently showing
• OptimizationFlowSummaryRoutes for Neo - requires the OptimizationFlowSummary table to contain outputs for the scenario the map is currently showing

In both cases the configuration is similar; first we will cover a Hopper example and then a Neo example.

Hopper Walkthrough

1. The user has selected TransportationRoutesMapLayer as the table to use for the currently selected map layer (Routes - MK Artic); this layer shows routes which use the asset called "MK Artic".
2. The Waypoint Routes toggle can be turned on by the user if they want to generate detailed road network routes and display these on the map.

Please note:

• The Waypoint Routes toggle is disabled when an unsupported table is selected in the Table Name drop-down and the following warning is shown when hovering over the Waypoint Routes toggle:

• A warning is displayed in case the table needed to generate the waypoints is not populated:

In our example case neither warning comes up, and the user turns on the Waypoint Routes option:

1. The user has switched the Waypoint Routes toggle to on.
2. The Skip Populated Routes toggle gives users the option to skip calculation of waypoints for routes that have already been calculated previously. The toggle is turned on by default to reduce calculation time. Turn this option off if coordinates have changed.
3. Click on the Generate Routes button to start the waypoint routes calculation.

Processing time depends on the number of origin-destination pairs. As an indication, a larger Hopper model with ~3,000 routes took a little under 4 minutes to generate all waypoints.

Users can monitor the progress of the waypoint routes generation by opening the Model Activity panel:

1. To open the Model Activity panel, click on the blue speech bubble icon to the right in the toolbar across the top of Cosmic Frog.
2. We see that the routes calculation has already completed, indicated by the green check icon. A summary of how many routes were calculated successfully, how many failed, and how long it took is provided. Here, 19 routes were calculated in 2 seconds and none failed.

Once the calculation completes, the map is updated to show the routes the waypoints have been calculated for on the road network:

Neo Walkthrough

In this Neo example, we will generate road network flows for the following DC to Customer flows. This represents 1,333 unique origin-destination pairs:

1. Select the OptimizationFlowSummaryRoutes table from the Table Name drop-down.
2. Turn on the Waypoint Routes toggle.
3. Click on the Generate Routes button. While the waypoints are being calculated the button becomes greyed out and a spinner appears on it.
4. The user has opened the Model Activity panel, which shows:
   1. The routes that are currently being calculated. So far, it has calculated 880 of a total of 1,242 flows in about 3 minutes.
   2. The summary of routes that were calculated previously; 91 were calculated in about 14 seconds.

Once the waypoints have been calculated, the map updates and now looks as follows:

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Other Helpful Resources

• Learn more about the Neo engine
• Learn the Hopper basics in this Getting Started article