Systems and methods for managing space at a location for receiving assets

• US 10,672,277 B2
• Filed: 06/26/2018
• Issued: 06/02/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 04/26/2018
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Aurora Operations Incorporated (Aurora Innovation, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Uatc, LLC (Uber Technologies, Inc.)
• Inventors: Woodrow, Alden James, Wells, Alan Hugh, Pike, Maxwell MacGavin
• Primary Examiner(s): Antonucci, Anne Marie
• Application Number:
  US16/018,563
• Publication Number:
  US 20190333383A1
• Time in Patent Office: 707 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0027 involving a plurality of vehicles, e.g. fleet or convoy travelling fleet control of land vehicles from a control room G05D1/0297; traffic control systems for road vehicles G08G1/00; for marine craft G08G3/00; for aircraft G08G5/00
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0088 characterized by the autonomous decision making process, e.g. artificial intelligence, predefined behaviours using knowledge based models G06N5/00
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0297 by controlling means in a control room
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/223 Command input arrangements on the remote controller, e.g. joysticks or touch screens
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/227 Handing over between remote control and on-board control; Handing over between remote control arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/692 involving a plurality of disparate vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0631 Resource planning, allocation, distributing or scheduling for enterprises or organisations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06312 Adjustment or analysis of established resource schedule, e.g. resource or task levelling, or dynamic rescheduling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/08 Logistics, e.g. warehousing, loading or distribution; Inventory or stock management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/40 Business processes related to the transportation industry shipping G06Q10/083
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/008 communicating information to a remotely located station transmission systems for measured values G08C
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/0808 Diagnosing performance data testing of vehicles G01M17/00; testing of electrical installation on vehicles G01R31/005
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/127 to a central station ; Indicators in a central station
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/202 Dispatching vehicles on the basis of a location, e.g. taxi dispatching
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/207 with respect to certain areas, e.g. forbidden or allowed areas with possible alerting when inside or outside boundaries
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 5/0008 with other aircraft
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 5/0013 with a ground station
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 5/0026 located on the ground
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 5/0043 Traffic management of multiple aircrafts from the ground G08G5/003 takes precedence; data processing specially designed for resource management, e.g. scheduling or allocating time, human or machine resources G06Q10/06
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 5/0052 : for cruising combined instruments indicating more than one navigational value G01C23/00
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 5/0082 : for monitoring traffic from a ground station radar or analogous systems specially adapted for traffic control G01S13/91
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 7/00 : Traffic control systems for simultaneous control of two or more different kinds of craft
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 : Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/40 : for vehicles, e.g. vehicle-to-pedestrians [V2P]

Abstract

In one example embodiment, a computer-implemented method for managing available capacity at a location for receiving an asset includes obtaining data indicative of one or more first assets that will arrive at a first location within a first transfer hub at an arrival time, the one or more first assets being associated with a first service provider. The method includes determining an available capacity at the first location within the first transfer hub for receiving the one or more first assets at the arrival time. The method includes moving one or more second assets positioned at the first location to a second location within the first transfer hub to increase the available capacity at the first location for receiving the one or more first assets at the arrival time.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for monitoring an available capacity at a location to provide a vehicle-based service, the method comprising:

identifying, by a computing system that includes one or more computing devices, one or more assets that will arrive at a first location within a first transfer hub at an arrival time;

sending, by the computing system, data indicative of the one or more assets to a transportation network computing system associated with the first transfer hub;

obtaining, by the computing system, data indicative of an available capacity at the first location for receiving the one or more assets at the arrival time; and

controlling, by the computing system, the one or more assets to adjust the arrival time of the one or more assets at the first location based at least in part on the available capacity at the first location for receiving the one or more assets.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein sending data indicative of the one or more assets to a transportation network computing system associated with the first transfer hub comprises:

sending, by the computing system, a request to the transportation network computing system to allocate capacity for receiving the one or more assets at the first location within the first transfer hub.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein controlling the one or more assets based at least in part on the available capacity comprises:

controlling, by the computing system, the one or more assets to divert the one or more assets to a second transfer hub as opposed to the first transfer hub.

4. A computer-implemented method for managing available capacity at a location for receiving an asset, the method comprising:

obtaining, by a computing system that includes one or more computing devices, data indicative of one or more first assets that will arrive at a first location within a first transfer hub at an arrival time, the one or more first assets being associated with a first service provider;

obtaining, by the computing system, data indicative of a plurality of assets that will arrive at the first location between a current time and the arrival time, the plurality of assets associated with a plurality of service providers that include the first service provider;

obtaining, by the computing system, data indicative of a transfer schedule for moving one or more assets in the plurality of assets away from the first location between the current time and the arrival time;

determining, by the computing system, an available capacity at the first location within the first transfer hub for receiving the one or more first assets at the arrival time based, at least in part, on the data indicative of the plurality of assets that will arrive at the first location and the transfer schedule; and

moving, by the computing system, one or more second assets positioned at the first location to a second location within the first transfer hub to increase the available capacity at the first location for receiving the one or more first assets at the arrival time.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 4, wherein obtaining data indicative of the one or more first assets that will arrive at the first location within the first transfer hub at the arrival time comprises:

receiving, by the computing system, a request for allocating capacity at the first location to receive the one or more first assets.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 4, wherein determining the available capacity at the first location within the first transfer hub for receiving the one or more first assets at the arrival time comprises:

obtaining, by the computing system, data indicative of a total capacity associated with the first location;

obtaining, by the computing system, data indicative of the one or more second assets positioned at the first location from at least one of a camera or a sensor associated with the first location; and

determining, by the computing system, the available capacity based at least in part on the total capacity and the one or more second assets.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 4, wherein the data indicative of the plurality of assets includes a vehicle location associated with one or more assets in the plurality of assets.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 4, wherein moving the one or more second assets at the first location to the second location within the first transfer hub to increase the available capacity at the first location for receiving the one or more first assets that will arrive at the arrival time comprises:

scheduling, by the computing system, an assignment for a jockey to move the one or more second assets from the first location to the second location.

9. A computing system for monitoring an available capacity at a location to provide a vehicle-based service, the computing system comprising:

one or more processors; and

one or more tangible, non-transitory, computer readable media that collectively store instructions that when executed by the one or more processors cause the computing system to perform operations, the operations comprising;

identifying one or more first assets scheduled to arrive at a first location within a first transfer hub at an arrival time;

sending data indicative of the one or more first assets to a transportation network computing system associated with the first transfer hub;

obtaining data indicative of an available capacity at the first location for receiving the one or more first assets at the arrival time; and

controlling the one or more first assets to adjust the arrival time of the one or more assets at the first location based at least in part on the available capacity at the first location for receiving the one or more assets.

10. The computing system of claim 9, wherein sending data indicative of the one or more first assets to a transportation network computing system associated with the first transfer hub comprises:

sending a request to the transportation network computing system to allocate capacity for receiving the one or more first assets at the first location within the first transfer hub.

11. The computing system of claim 9, wherein controlling the one or more first assets based at least in part on the available capacity comprises:

controlling the one or more first assets to divert the one or more first assets to a second transfer hub as opposed to the first transfer hub.

12. A computing system for managing available capacity at a location for receiving an asset, the computing system comprising:

one or more processors; and

one or more tangible, non-transitory, computer readable media that collectively store instructions that when executed by the one or more processors cause the computing system to perform operations, the operations comprising;

obtaining data indicative of one or more first assets scheduled to arrive at a first location within a first transfer hub at an arrival time, the one or more first assets being associated with a first service provider;

obtaining, by the computing system, data indicative of a plurality of assets that will arrive at the first location between a current time and the arrival time, the plurality of assets associated with a plurality of service providers that include the first service provider;

obtaining, by the computing system, data indicative of a transfer schedule for moving one or more assets in the plurality of assets away from the first location between the current time and the arrival time;

determining an available capacity at the first location within the first transfer hub for receiving the one or more first assets at the arrival time based, at least in part, on the data indicative of the plurality of assets that will arrive at the first location and the transfer schedule; and

moving one or more second assets positioned at the first location to a second location within the first transfer hub to increase the available capacity at the first location for receiving the one or more first assets at the arrival time.

13. The computing system of claim 12, wherein obtaining data indicative of the one or more first assets scheduled to arrive at the first location within the first transfer hub at the arrival time comprises:

receiving a request for space at the first location to receive the one or more first assets.

14. The computing system of claim 12, wherein determining the available capacity at the first location within the first transfer hub for receiving the one or more first assets at the arrival time comprises:

obtaining data indicative of a total capacity associated with the first location;

obtaining data indicative of the one or more second assets positioned at the first location from at least one of a camera or a sensor associated with the first location; and

determining the available capacity based at least in part on the total capacity and the one or more second assets.

15. The computing system of claim 12, wherein the data indicative of the plurality of assets includes a vehicle location associated with one or more assets in the plurality of assets.

16. The computing system of claim 12, wherein moving the one or more second assets at the first location to the second location within the first transfer hub to increase the available capacity at the first location for receiving the one or more first assets scheduled to arrive at the arrival time comprises:

scheduling an assignment for a jockey to move the one or more second assets from the first location to the second location at a time before the arrival time.