METHOD AND DEVICE FOR GENERATING TOLL INFORMATION IN A ROAD-TOLL SYSTEM

• US 20110125558A1
• Filed: 10/08/2010
• Published: 05/26/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 11/23/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Kapsch TrafficCom AG (Datax Handelsgmbh)
• Original Assignee: Kapsch TrafficCom AG (Datax Handelsgmbh)
• Inventors: Kersten, Jan, Van Haperen, Peter, Tijink, Jasja
• Granted Patent: US 9,269,197 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/13
• CPC Class Codes: G07B 15/063 using wireless information transmission between the vehicle and a fixed station identification of vehicles G08G

Abstract

A method for generating toll information for vehicle devices in a road-toll system with a toll center and geographically distributed radio beacons. The method includes providing a set of location data of toll-requiring geo-objects from the respective local environment of a beacon in this beacon, recording a sequence of position data of a vehicle device in this vehicle device, if the aforementioned vehicle device is in the transmitting/receiving range of a beacon: receiving the location-data set from this beacon in the vehicle device, comparing the position-data sequence with the received location-data set in the vehicle device in order to generate toll information therefrom, and if the above-mentioned vehicle device is in the transmitting/receiving range of a beacon: transmitting the toll information from the vehicle device via the beacon to the toll center. The invention further relates to a vehicle device, a beacon and a monitoring device for such a road-toll system.

Claims

1. A method for generating toll information from movements of vehicle devices in a road-toll system that comprises at least one toll center and a plurality of connected, geographically distributed beacons for short-range radio communication with the vehicle devices, the method comprising:

providing, in a beacon, a set of location data of one or more toll-requiring geo-objects from a local environment of said beacon;

recording, in a vehicle device, a sequence of position data of said vehicle device;

when said vehicle device is in the transmitting/receiving range of said beacon, receiving the location-data set from said beacon in the vehicle device;

comparing the position-data sequence with the received location-data set in the vehicle device to generate toll information therefrom; and

when said vehicle device is in the transmitting/receiving range of a beacon, transmitting the toll information from the vehicle device via the beacon to the toll center.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein said local environment of the beacon is larger than its transmitting/receiving range, wherein a location data set of an adjacent beacon is also provided, and wherein the data set of the adjacent position is also received and compared with the position-data sequence.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the position data is acquired and recorded with a satellite-navigation receiver of the vehicle device.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the short-range radio communication between vehicle device and the beacon takes place according to the DSRC, WAVE or WLAN standard.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the location-data set further includes fee information utilized for generation of the toll data.

6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the location-data set further includes checksums or hash functions to verify its currentness, validity or completeness.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein the generated toll information is location-anonymized.

8. A vehicle device for a road toll system comprising:

a satellite-navigation receiver for generating a sequence of position data;

a first memory for storing the position-data sequence;

a short-range transceiver for radio communication with one of a plurality of geographically distributed beacons when the vehicle device is in the transmitting/receiving range of one of the said beacons; and

a second memory for holding at least one set of location data of toll-requiring geo-objects from the environment of the beacon, wherein said location-data set was received by the short-range transceiver from said beacon, wherein the vehicle device is configured to compare the recorded position-data sequence with the received location-data set or sets to generate toll information therefrom, and to transmit said toll information via the short-range transceiver to a beacon when the vehicle device is in the transmitting/receiving range of said beacon.

9. The vehicle device according to claim 8, wherein the second memory is a ring buffer, which holds only the most recently received location-data set or sets.

10. The vehicle device according to claim 8, wherein the second memory holds fee information received with the location-data sets, which is utilized by the vehicle device to generate the toll information.

11. The vehicle device according to claim 8, wherein the short-range transceiver is one or more of the group consisting of a DSRC, WAVE and WLAN transceiver.

12. A beacon for a road toll system, with a short-range transceiver for radio communication with vehicle devices that are located in its transmitting/receiving range, comprising:

a memory for holding a set of location data of toll-requiring geo-objects from the environment of the beacon, wherein the beacon transmits said location-data set to vehicle devices in its transmitting/receiving range.

13. The beacon according to claim 12, wherein the memory also holds location-data sets of adjacent beacons and the beacon also transmits said location data for adjacent beacons to vehicle devices in its transmitting/receiving range.

14. The beacon according to claim 12 that is connected to a toll center of the road-toll system for receiving the location-data sets from the toll center.

15. The beacon according to claim 12, wherein the beacon relays toll information received from vehicle devices to a toll center.

16. The beacon according to claim 12, wherein the beacon calculates toll information from position-data sequences received from vehicle devices and relays the toll information to a toll center.

17. A monitoring device for a road-toll system with at least one beacon according to claim 15, wherein the monitoring device is configured to detect movements of vehicle devices, and configured to check, based on the location-data set of the beacon and the detected movements of vehicle devices in the local environment of the beacon, the toll information transmitted from these vehicle devices.

18. The monitoring device according to claim 16, wherein the monitoring device is configured to detect movements of vehicle devices, and configured to check, based on the location-data set of the beacon and the detected movements of the vehicle devices in the local environment of the beacon, the toll information of said vehicle devices generated by the beacon.

19. The monitoring device according to claim 17, wherein in case of a negative checking result, the monitoring device initiates further measures, including photographic or video recording or recording and storage of data from the vehicle device.

20. The monitoring device according to claim 18, wherein in case of a negative checking result, the monitoring device initiates further measures, including photographic or video recording, or recording and storage of data from the vehicle device.