Rhetorical Analysis of an article on
GPS tracking and Real Time Passenger Information
By Douaa Labdouni
City College of New York
Instructor: Susan Delamare
December 02, 2023
Author’s Note
This article was written as assigned by Professor Susan Delamare for the course English 21007, Writing for Engineering. Questions concerning this paper should be addressed to Douaa Labdouni,
Contact: [email protected]
This rhetorical analysis is a peer-review of the paper, Development of a Map-Matching Algorithm for Rural Passenger Information Systems through Mobile Phones and Crowd Sourcing by N. Velaga et. al. as posted in the Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering. This article provides a lot of useful information on the methods and functionality of real-time passenger information, RTPI, within a tracking system. It is also helpful in gauging the prospective benefits of Map-Matching technology to aid RTPI and GPS tracking data. A rhetorical analysis is important to decipher the implications of an article and to get a full scope of how to conduct and write about projects in the future.
The exigent problem addressed in this article is the lack of user-based input in GPS tracking apps. User-based input includes things such as precise location and movement data, crowd-sourcing, weather updates, and potential delays. The article specifically addresses these problems in non-urban communities where public transportation is not as developed. The authors claim that RPTI and Map-Matching (MM) technologies will “compensate for the lack of a vehicle tracking system in public transportation, particularly in nonurban areas” (Velaga et al., 2012, p. 732.)
All of the authors of this article share a common university of affiliation, that being King’s College University of Aberdeen in the UK. This leads me to believe that the authors are all colleagues who share a similar research interest in transportation. Two of the authors, Mark Beecroft and John D. Nelson, are associated with their university’s Centre for Transport Research. Nelson is a professor as well as the chair of the department and Beecroft is a lecturer of the department. There are also economic researchers involved in writing this article; Nagendra R. Velaga, David Corsar, Peter Edwards, and Nirwan Sharma. Velaga is the main author of the article and is an Assistant Professor at the Indian Institute of Technology as well as a Digital Economy Research Fellow at King’s. Corsar and Sharma also conduct research at King’s College Digital Economy Research Hub while Edwards is the Director. Two of the authors, Somayajulu Sripada and Peter Edwards, have backgrounds in Computer Science as well. Sripada is a Senior Lecturer in the Computing Science Department and Edwards is a Professor in the department. Due to all of the authors’ profound and vast expertise in the topics related to these transit technologies, this article has strong validity. They are not all from the same background so this article was written from the perspective of many professional disciplines and knowledge.
The audience addressed in the document is likely people who live in places where public transportation is not as developed and would like to personally benefit from RTPI, as well as urban developers who work, alongside transit organizations, to provide tracking methods for public transportation. The article mentions an app prototype, GetThere, that seems appealing to commuters whose public transportation networks don’t already provide convenient tracking methods. This is presumably to entice readers who would like to easily improve their transportation process. For instance, the authors advertise “This screen displays the current location of the buses…The users can refresh the locations…create alerts to be notified before the bus reaches a particular location…and then selecting a location on the map….an alert setup screen is shown” (Velaga et al, 2017, p. 736.) Additionally, the article might also be addressed to app developers or investors who would like to push this research forward because it promotes a business possibility that can be implemented in many cities and rural areas.
Figure 1
RPTI system architecture flowchart
Note: Reprinted from “Development of a Map-Matching Algorithm for Rural Passenger Information Systems through Mobile Phones and Crowd Sourcing” by Velaga et al., 2012. (https://ascelibrary-org.ccny-proxy1.libr.ccny.cuny.edu/doi/10.1061/%28ASCE%29CP.1943-5487.0000238)
Throughout the article, several appeals of ethos occur. The strategic placement of evidence supporting RTPI and MM appeals to ethos by providing credibility for these two tracking methods. This is evident above in Figure 1. Their appeal to both ethos and logos can also be seen when they write evidence that confirms RTPI works and that the system has been tested in cities in the past (Velaga et al., 2012, p. 734.) Additionally, the authors’ names and affiliations are easily accessible, establishing their knowledge and credibility further. The authors also successfully appeal to logos in the way they present their solution to the problem of lack of transportation information in certain areas. For instance, by writing “Passengers can allow the system to track their location through their smartphones when they are traveling on public transportation; this will compensate for the lack of a vehicle tracking system in public transportation, particularly in nonurban areas” (Velaga et al., 2017, p. 733), they provide a logical and straightforward explanation of their work and their proposed app. While these two appeals are strong, the article fails to appeal to pathos.
Reference:
Velaga N., Nelson J., Edwards P., Corsar E., Sripada S., Sharma N., Beecroft M. (2012). Development of a Map-Matching Algorithm for Rural Passenger Information Systems through Mobile Phones and Crowd Sourcing. Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering.
https://ascelibrary-org.ccny-proxy1.libr.ccny.cuny.edu/doi/10.1061/%28ASCE%29CP.1943-5487.0000238
