NAVIGATION SYSTEM AND ROUTE SEARCH METHOD

• US 20100228471A1
• Filed: 02/18/2009
• Published: 09/09/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 03/14/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Aisin AW Company Limited (Aisin Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Aisin AW Company Limited (Aisin Corp.)
• Inventors: Nagase, Kenji
• Granted Patent: US 8,706,408 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/200
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3492 employing speed data or traffic data, e.g. real-time or historical traffic control systems for road vehicles involving transmission of navigation instructions to the vehicle G08G1/0968
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0104 Measuring and analyzing of parameters relative to traffic conditions
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/096811 where the route is computed offboard
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/096844 where the complete route is dynamically recomputed based on new data

Abstract

When a destination is set, a CPU transmits to an information distribution center average vehicle speed information and so on together with a request command requesting for statistical traffic information. On the other hand, a CPU selects statistical traffic information per vehicle speed region of a predetermined vehicle speed region for each secondary mesh to thereby search for a basic route to the destination. Subsequently, the CPU identifies a vehicle speed region for each road type from the average vehicle speed information and a vehicle speed region determination table, selects for each mesh ID of all the secondary meshes through which the basic route passes the statistical traffic information per vehicle speed region corresponding to the vehicle speed region identified for each road type from the statistical traffic information per vehicle speed region classified by road types, and distributes it to a navigation device.

Claims

1. A navigation system, comprising:

an average vehicle speed obtaining unit obtaining an average vehicle speed of a vehicle for each road type;

a traffic information storage unit storing traffic information of each link which is classified by road type and classified by predetermined vehicle speed region; and

a traffic information obtaining unit obtaining the traffic information corresponding to the average vehicle speed of the vehicle for each road type.

2. The navigation system according to claim 1, further comprising:

a map information storage unit storing map information divided into a plurality of areas;

an input unit inputting a place of departure and a destination; and

a basic route search unit searching for a basic route from the place of departure to the destination based on the map information, wherein

the traffic information obtaining unit obtains the traffic information corresponding to a predetermined area including the basic route.

3. The navigation system according to claim 1, wherein

the average vehicle speed is an average vehicle speed during uncongested road traveling.

5. The navigation system according to claim 2, wherein

the average vehicle speed is an average vehicle speed during uncongested road traveling.

4. A route search method, comprising the steps of:

obtaining an average vehicle speed of a vehicle for each road type; and

obtaining traffic information corresponding to the average vehicle speed of the vehicle for each road type from traffic information of each link which is classified by road type and classified by predetermined vehicle speed region.