Väylävirasto (Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency).
Modernising critical project information workflows for Finland’s transport infrastructure
- Application performance improved from 30–60 seconds to 1–3 seconds
- Guided workflows improve data quality and reduce user errors
- Unified development + maintenance model ensures faster fixes and continuity
- A smoother, more intuitive experience across the Velho ecosystem
Project Summary.
Väylävirasto, the Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency, manages the planning, construction and maintenance of Finland’s road, rail and maritime networks. A key part of this work relies on Velho, the agency’s central system for infrastructure information management.
Within the Velho ecosystem, Projektivelho functions as the authoritative source for project, subproject and assignment data, running on AWS. It ensures consistent structuring of project information and traceability between projects and assets.
Nordcloud joined as the development and maintenance partner for Projektivelho as part of a multi‑vendor team with shared processes and functionalities for the Velho ecosystem development programme.
The Challenges.
When Nordcloud entered the project, Projektivelho faced critical issues affecting both users and business operations:
Slow performance hindering adoption
Initial load times could reach 30–60 seconds, causing frustration and discouraging use. Many users avoided the system entirely because waiting nearly a minute to open it disrupted their daily work.
Unstable system with a growing backlog
Frequent bugs and an extensive list of unresolved issues made the system unreliable. Users regularly reported broken flows or incorrect document behaviours.
Unintuitive workflows affecting data quality
The old UI didn’t guide users to input the right information. As a result, project documentation was often incomplete or inconsistent.
Complex multi‑application architecture
Projektivelho is one of roughly 20 interconnected front‑end and back‑end applications in the Velho ecosystem. It takes significant time to understand the architecture. Frequent team changes had previously slowed progress.
Need for simultaneous development and maintenance
The legacy system had to remain operational, even as a new version was being rebuilt. This required tight coordination and deep product knowledge.
The Solution.
Väylävirasto’s goal was clear: to stabilise the existing system and build a new, future‑proof version, all without disrupting critical operations. We achieved that through a combination of user‑focused redesign, performance improvements and a development + maintenance model tailored for a complex, evolving system.
Intuitive user experience.
We placed user needs at the centre. Together with designers and the customer, we created streamlined flows that:
- guide users to fill information correctly,
- reduce errors and inconsistencies
- make day‑to‑day project work more intuitive
Now engineers, consultants and project managers across Väylävirasto’s ecosystem can easily create projects with documents and assignments, whether it’s a new road build or a railway upgrade. The workflow is clear from start to finish.
Performance that encourages use.
A major breakthrough came from rethinking how the micro‑applications load. The old system loaded each one synchronously, waiting for every component to finish before showing the UI.
Nordcloud replaced this with a modern asynchronous loading model, where everything loads at the same time, drastically improving speed. The impact was immediate: users no longer hesitate to open Projektivelho, ensuring better data quality and more timely updates.
Robust backend improvements.
Nordcloud refactored, fixed and enhanced backend services, improving reliability and preparing the ecosystem for future needs. Key AWS components used include:
- S3 for storing millions of assignment documents and frontend artefacts
- ECS for containerised backend workloads
- Load balancers, Lambda functions, step functions, SQS/SNS, and CI/CD with CodePipeline, CodeBuild and CodeArtifact
- New backend integrations, such as with Vektor.io, and creation of a new material backend service
This modern cloud architecture ensures scalability, reliability and future‑proof performance.
Dev + support for continuity and speed.
Combining development and maintenance was a crucial aspect for Väylävirasto. Rather than splitting teams or handing off responsibilities, the same experts:
- maintained the old application while building the new one
- transitioned users smoothly
- maintain the new generation of Projektivelho
This approach has delivered clear outcomes:
Deep system knowledge → faster fixes. With a complex environment of about 20 interlinked applications, familiarity is crucial. Nordcloud team of 6 full-stack developers and an architect understands the full ecosystem, enabling rapid issue identification and resolution.
No onboarding delays. New developers would require months just to understand the landscape; Nordcloud’s continuity eliminates this overhead.
Higher quality over time. When the same team maintains what they build, they naturally prioritise clarity, stability and long‑term resilience.
Balanced priorities. The team can shift between new development and urgent fixes without friction. This was essential given ongoing bug reports from users and support teams.
In a system as large and evolving as Projektivelho, this unified model has been key to keeping the platform healthy while continuously improving it.
Continuous improvements .
When no critical bugs are reported, the team focuses on refining the system: cleaning up legacy code, improving flows and modernising backend components. If legislation or customer requirements change, Nordcloud can react immediately because they know the system inside out.
This ensures the system evolves steadily, rather than stalling between development phases.
We wanted a strong partner for Velho’s continued development – one who could help us build all the features end users need for producing and maintaining information. Nordcloud was that partner, as demonstrated by their strong development team, collaboration and commitment. Development has been flexible yet controlled, following a long-term plan but able to respond to urgent development needs raised by users.
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Results.
The impact of the transformation is clear:
Dramatically improved speed and user experience
Load times dropped from 30–60 seconds to 1–3 seconds, making Projektivelho a responsive tool users are comfortable working with.
Higher adoption and satisfaction
The new system has been widely praised for speed and for guiding users to create accurate project data.
Better data quality and consistency
Guided flows support correct documentation, improving the reliability of Projektivelho’s infrastructure records.
Greater stability and maintainability
With Nordcloud handling both development and maintenance, the system runs smoothly and problems are resolved quickly.
Future‑proof foundations
The system’s architecture and UI are prepared for long‑term evolution and upcoming initiatives, like redesigning and development of a map application that works together with Projektivelho, as well as ongoing maintenance.
Collaboration: A trusted partnership.
Over time, the relationship between Väylävirasto and Nordcloud has become one of deep trust, transparency and shared commitment.
Väylävirasto’s product owner values Nordcloud’s technical decisions; Nordcloud appreciates the customer’s clarity and openness. The team highlights this collaboration as one of the best they’ve experienced.
System development has generated both cost and time savings, and data quality has improved. Because we centralised data management, other systems can use Velho’s data. This has provided additional efficiencies because we no longer have to maintain the same data in multiple locations.
