DYNAMIC ETA AND STA TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM

• US 20150046083A1
• Filed: 09/20/2013
• Published: 02/12/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 08/08/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Accenture Global Services Limited (Accenture PLC)
• Original Assignee: Accenture Global Services Limited (Accenture PLC)
• Inventors: Paul, Sanjoy, Bhadkaria, Saurabh, MAITRA, Anutosh, Ghosh, Chiranjeeb
• Granted Patent: US 9,530,314 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/465
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3407 specially adapted for specific applications
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/123 indicating the position of vehicles, e.g. scheduled vehicles; Managing passenger vehicles circulating according to a fixed timetable, e.g. buses, trains, tramstransmission of navigation instructions to vehicles G08G1/0968
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks

Abstract

A transportation system may store a standard time of arrival table including standard time of arrivals for fixed stops and waypoints or geo-sections. Delay of a vehicle reaching a fixed stop is determined and may be used to determine an estimated time of arrival to a destination on the route. Delay may be determined in response to traversing the waypoints or geo-sections on the route, and the estimated time of arrival may be updated according to the delay at each waypoint or geo-section.

Claims

1. A transportation system to determine estimated time of arrival (ETA), the system comprising:

a data storage to store a standard time of arrival (STA) table, wherein the STA table includes an STA for a fixed stop along a fixed route and an STA for each waypoint or geo-section along the fixed route; and

at least one processor to;

determine, for a vehicle traveling on the fixed route and travelling towards the fixed stop from an origin, an actual time of arrival (ATA) of the vehicle at the waypoints or geo-sections along the fixed route between the origin and the fixed stop,

determine a delay at each of the waypoints or geo-sections, wherein the delay for each waypoint or geo-section is determined as a difference between the STA from the STA table for the waypoint or geo-section and the ATA of the vehicle at the waypoint or the geo-section, and

determine an ETA of the vehicle at the fixed stop, wherein the ETA is determined as a sum of the delay at each waypoint or geo-section added to the STA of the fixed stop.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is to:

determine whether for a period of M number of days, if delays for at least one of the waypoints or geo-sections or the fixed stop is greater than a threshold for N consecutive days within the M number of days, wherein M and N are greater than 1,

in response to the delays for the at least one waypoint or geo-section or the fixed stop being greater than the threshold for N consecutive days within the M number of days, determine a new STA for the at least one waypoint or geo-section or the fixed stop based on the delays, and

store the new STA for the at least one waypoint or geo-section or the fixed stop in the STA table.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the new STA for the at least one waypoint or geo-section or the fixed stop is based on an old STA for the at least one waypoint or geo-section or the fixed stop and at least one delay determined for the at least one waypoint or geo-section or the fixed stop.

4. The system of claim 2, wherein the at least one processor is to calculate the threshold by multiplying a standard deviation of the delay with a user-defined value, n, wherein n is greater than 0.

5. The system of claim 2, wherein the at least one processor is to calculate N, wherein N is a mean of consecutive days the delays exceeded the threshold within the M days.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the fixed route includes a plurality of fixed stops, and the STA table stores an STA for each fixed stop and the at least one processor is to calculate an ETA for each fixed stop based on ATAs for previous fixed steps and intervening waypoints or geo-sections.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein a geographic area including the fixed route is divided into the geo-sections, each having a length equal to one another.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein a geographic area including the fixed route is divided into the geo-sections, each having a length determined according to a distance that can be traversed for a predetermined time interval.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein different ones of the geo-sections have different lengths.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the ATA of the vehicle at the waypoints or geo-sections and the ETA of the vehicle at the fixed stop are determined from measurements only made by a global positioning system of the vehicle.

11. A method to estimate ETAs for stops on a vehicle'"'"'s route, the method comprising:

determining an origin and a destination for the vehicle travelling from the origin to the destination on the route, wherein the route includes a plurality of fixed stops;

downloading, via a computer network, locations of the plurality of fixed stops from a remote system and STAs for the plurality of fixed stops;

determining a current location of the vehicle on the route;

determining, from the locations and the current location, a closest fixed stop on the route to the current location of the vehicle;

determining an ETA to the closest fixed stop based on a distance from the current location to the closest fixed stop;

determining a delay for the closest fixed stop from the ETA and an STA of the closest fixed stop; and

determining, by a processor, an ETA to the destination based on the delay and an STA for the destination.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein determining the closest fixed stop comprises:

querying a distance application program interface or a direction application program interface to determine the closest fixed stop to the current location.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein the closest fixed stop is a next fixed stop on the route to be traversed by the vehicle travelling from the current location.

14. The method of claim 11, wherein determining the ETA to the closest fixed stop comprises:

identifying a predetermined average speed for a segment of the route between the current location and the closest fixed stop; and

determining the ETA to the closest fixed stop from the average speed and the distance between the current location and the closest fixed stop along a direction of movement.

15. The method of claim 11, wherein the ETA for the destination is updated according to a delay determined for each fixed stop between the closest fixed stop and the destination on the route.

20. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 15, wherein the delay for the closest waypoint is determined from an ETA for the closest waypoint and a predetermined STA of the closest waypoint.

16. A non-transitory computer readable medium including machine readable instructions executed by at least one processor to:

determine a destination of a vehicle traveling on a non-fixed route to the destination;

identify all stored routes between a current location of the vehicle and the destination, wherein each route includes a plurality of waypoints;

determine a current route of the stored routes on which the vehicle is determined to be travelling;

determine a closest waypoint to the current location on the current route;

determine a delay for the closest waypoint;

estimate an ETA for the destination based on the delay and an STA for the destination for the current route;

determine whether the vehicle remains on the current route based on whether the vehicle traverses a next waypoint for the current route; and

continue to estimate the ETA for the destination based on a delay determined for each subsequent waypoint traversed on the current route in response to determining the vehicle remains on the current route.

17. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 16, wherein to determine whether the vehicle remains on the current route comprises instructions to:

determine an ETA for the next waypoint on the current route; and

determine whether the vehicle traverses the next waypoint within a predetermined time of the ETA.

18. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein if the vehicle traverses the next waypoint within the predetermined time of the ETA, determining the vehicle remains on the current route;

and

if the vehicle does not traverse the next waypoint within the predetermined time of the ETA, setting a trigger indicating the vehicle has potentially changed routes to the destination.

19. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein in response to the trigger being set, the instructions are to:

identify a next waypoint traversed by the vehicle towards the destination;

determine a new current route from the stored routes based on the identified next waypoint; and

determine an ETA to the destination based on the new current route.