Proceedings of ICCTA2011

A NOVEL TRAFFIC CAPACITY PLANNING

METHODOLOGY FOR LTE RADIO NETWORK
DIMENSIONING
Jun Gu, Yufeng Ruan, Xi Chen, Chaowei Wang
ZTE Corporation Shanghai 201203, China
gu.jun@zte.com.cn, chen.xi22@zte.com.cn, ruan.yuefeng@zte.com.cn, wangchaowei@bupt.edu.cn
Abstract
Traffic capacity planning is a challenging task in
multiple input multiple output (MIMO) &
orthogonal frequency division (OFDM) based long
term evolution (LTE) cellular networks, resulted
from emerging diverse multimedia traffic
requirement, together with highly open & flexible
air interface design in LTE. In this paper, a new
methodology for dynamic real-time capacity
planning is proposed for LTE radio network
dimensioning, based on unified traffic process
mechanism, fresh simulation methodology for air
interface, and smart self-evaluation and
optimization. By corresponding software design
and implementation, it provides powerful tool for
LTE network planners to get efficient, accurate
and professional capacity planning outcome
without much manual effort.
Keywords: Long-term evolution (LTE);capacity
planning;traffic; simulation
1 Introduction
Since 2009, LTE technology has attracted great
interests from top operators around the world.
With the enhanced technical flexibility and
improved network capability, LTE shows to be the
great momentum for the convergence of cellular
network and internet, which will bring
revolutionary transform of traffic pattern in
cellular networks. Traffic diversity, along with the
flexibility and complexity of LTE air interface,
bring the capacity planning for cellular network
into new dilemma [1].
In traditional 2G/3G cellular network, circuit
switched voice traffic is the dominant service and
Erlang formula is the most popular and useful
methodology to calculate network capacity [2],
given specific network configuration information
and call blocking probability. When coming into
mixed traffic dimensioning, with diverse resource
requirement for different traffic type, knapsack
model for multiple traffic capacity planning
became more popular under the assumption that
the network has fixed resource (number of
channels in
GSM network, etc). In order to cope with the
dynamic requirement in more advanced wireless
system, such as LTE, WiMAX, stochastic
knapsack is proposed, without considering the
influence of packet level behavior[3][4]. In [5], a
systematic capacity estimation methodology for
system beyond IMT-2000 provides a way to
calculate resource requirement in packet switch
based wireless network, with the packet level
characteristics into consideration. In this method,
the main drawback comes from the fact that it is
under the assumption of fixed spectrum efficiency
for given scenario, which in fact is not the case due
to the interplay among traffic characteristics,
algorithm behavior and network performance.
In LTE, due to the introduction of various
advanced link level and system level techniques,
such as flexible bandwidth, OFDM, MIMO, inter-
cell interference coordination (ICIC), inter-cell
power control (PC), frequency domain fast
scheduling (FDFS), the network enables great
flexibility in higher date rate provision and better
quality of service (QoS) guarantee[1][6][7], but at
the same time, it is more complex to gain precisely
quantitative insight into system capability under
different service provision scenarios, especially for
practical LTE network deployment, which requires
professional capacity planning for improved user
experience and reduced cost.
Generally, capacity planning is the process to
determine network topology and configuration
(number of site, MIMO configuration, basic radio
parameter determination, etc), under the
constraints of service requirement based on traffic
growth prediction; in addition, operators strategy
should be taken into consideration with highest
priority before concrete network design. According
to previous illustration, due to the strong inter-
action of different aspect in LTE cellular networks,
traditional methodology for capacity could be
taken to dynamic LTE system, even if with some
enhancement.
Therefore, for LTE network, system level
simulation became more and more important due
to its capability in investigating systematic
performance, with specific modeling method under
certain evaluation target. Among the three popular
simulation methods (static, semi-static, dynamic),
dynamic system simulation is the most powerful in
revealing accurate system performance. But due to
highly complex modeling and low efficiency, it is
prohibitively difficult for network planners to use
such platform to search for optimum capacity
planning result.
In this paper, a novel system simulation design
based LTE radio network capacity planning
methodology is proposed for intelligent optimum
result search, given specific traffic information. It
includes key components of unified traffic
processing, flexible air interface adaptation and
simulation and Smart evaluation & optimization.
And specially, for air interface simulation,
probabilistic interference modeling and user
mapping transform multi-cell simulation into
single cell simulation while keeping system
characteristics, with dramatic reduction on
simulation complexity.
2 Methodology framework illustration
The overall framework of the proposed LTE radio
network capacity planning methodology is shown
in Figure 1. Generally, this methodology is based
on innovative iterated system simulation to find
optimum capacity planning solution, based on
specific traffic requirement.
Figure 1 LTE capacity planning methodology
For the input part, it consists of two main elements:
1) traffic requirement input: in order to achieve
instructive capacity planning outcome, a complete
set of information about traffic prediction in future
network should be provided, scenario definition
(Dense urban, urban, suburban, rural, and so on),
population distribution (population density in each
scenario), service penetration ratio, traffic type,
traffic arrival density, traffic QoS requirement, etc.
In addition, the definition should be taken
operators specific strategy into consideration with
highest priority, which is of vital importance to the
quantitative definition of above traffic related
requirement. 2) Parameter input: two types of
parameters are defined. First class is the basic
radio and engineer parameters, which includes
System bandwidth, transmission power (total
power, power allocation/control parameter),
antenna type/pattern, MIMO configuration, and so
on. The second class is optimization parameters
and tuned to search for optimum capacity planning
solution. Typically, such class mainly refers to
inter-site distance and antenna downtilt, and for
more advanced planning, some radio parameters
(power parameter, bandwidth parameters, etc)
could be chosen as optional optimization
parameters.

Before iterated optimization, a unified traffic
process module is design to transform
aforementioned diverse traffic requirement into
uniform form format for convenient air interface
simulation. In this procedure, the complex service
requirement from operator is translated into
simultaneous online user number and QoS
requirement for each traffic type and then such
information is put into the iterated simulation
process.
Iterated dynamic simulation based optimization
process is the key of proposed LTE capacity
planning methodology. After determining the
unified traffic requirement and basic engineering
and radio parameters, the optimization parameters
should be initiated. Then optimization target is set
and the whole iteration process starts, which is
followed by dynamic simulation and smart
optimization.
In the dynamic simulation part, firstly, real-time
traffic data is generated based on the information
received from unified traffic processing module,
and the output traffic packet is storage in data
buffer for scheduling. Then CINR modeling and
user mapping the two core components are carried
out. By multi-cell topology and wrap around
relationship construction, together with large
amount of randomly dropped CINR collection
users (CCU), CINR distribution is collected in
network wide basis. The CINR collection process
is aided by random inter-cell interference selection
technique, and provides near-to-fact CINR
distribution under predetermined network topology
and system parameters, without the need of
scheduling. Based on the network CINR
distribution, and traffic user number in one cell
calculated from total online user number & site
number in current iteration, CINR mapped traffic
users (CMTU) are linked to specific CINR values
by probabilistic mapping according to CINR
cumulative density function (CDF). By such novel
processing, the simulation of one cell could be a
representative of the whole network in average
sense, hence it is reasonable to execute single cell
simulation during iteration. Such simplification
brings remarkable computation burden without
much performance loss. After the CINR collection
and user mapping, fast scheduling is execute on
transmission time interval (TTI) basis, and then
link throughput is determined from the relationship
with resource block (RB) number and CINR
through link level simulation under specific
channel model.
In order to obtain optimum capacity planning
solution, above dynamic system level simulation is
performed in iterated way, with automated
evaluation and optimization parameters setting
before next iteration. The self-evaluation process
decides whether or not the previous optimization
parameters fulfill capacity planning requirement
under predetermined conditions; the automated
search is in charge of optimization setting for next
round simulation and evaluation. In the self-
evaluation process, when the optimum solution is
found, iteration stops and capacity planning results
are delivered.
3 Unified traffic processing
In LTE, two class of traffic are defined as shown in
Table 1: guaranteed bit rate (GBR) and non-GBR,
and classified into 9 QCIs, with diverse
requirement on priority, packet delay and packet
loss rate, and impose different requirement on
radio resource management during resource
allocation. Some traffic examples for each type are
listed in the table [1].
Table 1 QoS Class Identifiers (QCIs) for LTE
During LTE network capacity planning process,
traffic model varies greatly. The simplest and
convenient way is to get complete information
about user density, traffic type/QoS requirement,
traffic mix pattern, call arrival density, etc. A
sample service requirement table is provided in
Table 2. And such set of information could be
translated into simultaneous online user number
and related QoS requirement for subsequent.
Table 2 Traffic requirement example
However, in many network planning cases, we
could only get rather rough information for service
requirement, and certain degree enhancement and
remodeling should be done before used for
simulation process:
1) If only aggregate throughput requirement is
provided, set of virtual full buffer traffic users
should be modeled. In this case, no explicit
QoS requirement is imposed on user and
during iteration, the data rate constraint is on
cell basis, the modeled user number and
attached full buffer property would be
delivered to air interface simulation.
2) If very rough traffic properties (user density,
traffic type, etc) are provided, typical QoS
settings for each type of traffic could be used
as default input. After such remedy and
simultaneous online user number calculation,
the traffic information is transfer to simulation.
3) If complete traffic model information is
provided, after simultaneous online user
number calculation, the traffic information is
delivered to simulation.
After the processing, the traffic requirement is
input into iterated simulation with uniform pattern:
simultaneous online user and marked QoS
requirement for each type of traffic. Therefore,
when carried out iteration, no matter what of traffic
(even non-type-service is included), the simulation
could be executed in a unified way without any
change to adapt to diverse input.
4 Flexible air interface and simulation
After finished unified traffic processing,
simultaneous online user number and associated
QoS requirement are delivered for dynamic
iterated system simulation, with uniform format.
Then simulation starts for optimum capacity
planning solution search.
4.1 Simulation parameter setup
Before integrated simulation, two types of
parameters should be setup:
1) Basic parameter
This class parameter mainly consists of the
basic network configuration such as system
bandwidth, transmission power, antenna
configuration, MIMO mode, ICIC mode, etc.
When entering into integration, such
parameters keep constant.
2) Optimization parameter
This type of parameter typically includes
network topology related configuration: inter-
site distance (ISD), antenna downtilt, etc. For
advanced capacity planning process, other
parameters could be chosen optionally for get
more intensive planning results. Such
parameters are determined automatically by
Automated Search module according to last
round simulation results evaluation, based on
smart search mechanism.
4.2 Traffic model adaptation
The aim of traffic model adaptation module is to
adjust simultaneous online user number and the
behavior of generated traffic packet.
1) User number adaptation
For each round of system simulation, a typical
network topology configuration is the ISD and
when different ISD is set, according to given
user density in predetermined planning area,
user number in each cell could be calculated
based on number of cell number derived from
single cell covered area. CMTU generation is
in accordance with the calculated user number.
Specifically, such user number is exclusively
used for dynamic traffic simulation and has no
relationship with the collection of CINR
distribution.
2) Traffic model adaptation
When number of simultaneous online cell
users is derived in 1), based on which CMTUs
are generated. According to previous
illustration, different types of traffic
requirement would be delivered. In this part,
randomly distributed packet size and arrival
process is explicitly modeled based on traffic
type and associated QoS parameters. The
generation of data packets is carried in a real-
time fashion and the formed packets are put
into radio link layer (RLC) buffer for
scheduling. With effectively transmitted data
mount/data rate/delay/jitter detection and
collection, the statistics of traffic requirement
satisfaction could be provided and used as
indicators for optimization parameter update
and judgment of capacity planning solution
quality.
4.3 CINR modeling
Carrier to interference and noise ratio (CINR)
modeling is the key process for determining
accurate statistic signal quality distribution in
network wide sense, which requires a certain
number of randomly dropped users in each for
covered area, especially for uplink because the
interference for uplink comes from terminal, where
the power is generated. Traditionally, the same
user set if generated for CINR collection and
traffic simulation, which require large number of
snapshots based simulation to get averaged results
under specific scenario and parameter setting.
In this paper, a novel simulation process
independent CINR modeling methodology is
proposed to get reliable CINR distribution and
simplify subsequent dynamic simulation, with only
one round simulation is necessary for each time of
iteration.
In the propose scheme, large number of traffic
dependent user are randomly distributed over
modeled area, and then:
1) For downlink
In each cell, for every user, reference signal
received power is calculated based on
propagation model, then interference is
derived base on system load set, with wrap
around technique, and finally CINR for each
user could be calculated. Based on the user
level CINR value, network level CINR
distribution is formed. Generally, CINR
collection process is similar to traditional art,
except for the principle for user number
setting over the concerned area.
2) For uplink
In the propose method, due to the
independence of CINR collection and
dynamic simulation process, there is no prior
information on frequency resource occupation
status, which is compulsory to decide whether
or not specific neighboring cell generates
interference upon serving cell, and from which
user, and hence randomized interferer
selection (RIS) method is designed to solve
this problem.
RIS methodology design complies with
network interference characteristic in statistic
sense, resulting from the random frequency
hopping behavior by dynamic scheduling. In
this scheme, for every power controlled user
in each serving cell, after received power
spectrum density (PSD) is calculated, an
interferer is randomly selected in neighboring
cell, with interference strength scaled by
system load. Then all interferences are
summed up for derivation of user level CINR.
The RIS methodology could reveal ICIC
impact by imposing constraints on flexibility
of interferer selection. All CCUs CINR
values are collected to form network CINR
distribution.
4.4 User mapping
User mapping is the process of CINR value
assignment for each terminal. In the CINR
modeling module, the network level CINR
distribution is collected through CCU behavior
modeling. Based on the collected CINR CDF, the
simultaneous online users are mapped to vertical
axis in uniform distributed manner. Specially, such
mapping process is only needed in cell basis and
the subsequent single cell simulation would be
effectively represent system level behavior while
largely reduce simulation burden compared with
traditional simulation methodology.
4.5 Traffic simulation
In this part, traffic simulation is carried out in TTI
basis. In each TTI, users are ordered based on
associated CINR value, QoS requirement and
buffer status and scheduled according to specific
scheduling principle and criteria. Then certain
number of RBs is allocated to each user for data
transmission. Link level performance is modeling
through throughput vs. SINR mapping based on
scenario based link level simulation.
5 Smart evaluation and optimization
During the iterated simulation, smart evaluation
and optimization update behave as two key
elements for planning result quality and process
efficiency. Smart evaluation is implemented to
investigate simulated performance after each round
simulation, and decide whether or not fulfilling
capacity planning target under allowable deviation.
If predetermined target is achieved, iteration would
be stopped and capacity planning results are
delivered for engineering usage.
If capacity planning target is not satisfied under
current optimization parameter configuration,
another round of simulation would be executed,
before which new set of optimization parameter
should be automatically configured. Determination
of new parameters is highly dependent on previous
performance evaluation. Based on the gap between
simulated performance and input requirement,
parameters for next round simulation are set
automatically with assistance of fast search
algorithm.
Based on the flexible air interface modeling,
dynamic traffic simulation is carried in iterated
fashion to search for optimum capacity planning
results, with updated network parameter
configuration in each round of simulation.
Specifically, the independent modeling for CINR
distribution and traffic simulation enable network
level averaged single cell simulation, which
dramatically reduces system complexity, without
much loss for simulation capability.
6 Conclusions
In this paper, a novel LTE network capacity
planning methodology is proposed for flexible,
accurate, and efficient network dimensioning,
based on unified traffic processing and iterated
simulation. For the simulation part, new network
modeling method dramatically improves system
efficiency and enables fast implementation
engineering usage. In addition, the intensively
modeled simulation platform could also be utilized
for theoretical research for LTE capacity planning
related topics.
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