Interactive traffic display and trip planner

• US 6,297,748 B1
• Filed: 10/26/1999
• Issued: 10/02/2001
• Est. Priority Date: 11/14/1996
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Shoemaker, Charles H., Bauer, Eric T., Lappenbusch, Richard W.
• Primary Examiner(s): SWARTHOUT, BRENT
• Application Number:
  US09/427,494
• Time in Patent Office: 707 Days
• Field of Search: 340/905, 340/990, 340/995, 701/117, 701/200, 701/201, 701/208, 701/211, 395/200.48, 348/148, 348/149
• US Class Current: 340/905
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0969 having a display in the form of a map

Abstract

The invention includes a traffic information system having servers that makes traffic data, images and video clips available to client devices in a common format that is independent of the format used within any particular public highway monitoring system that supplies the raw media elements. The invention further includes a user interface for depiction on a graphical display surface. The user interface has a road map showing a plurality of road segments that a user can interactively select. In addition, the user interface has a road image area that changes as the user selects different road segments to show recent images of a currently selected road segment. The images are obtained from public highway monitoring systems. Both a broad view and a detail view are available. In the broad view, highways are broken into high level segments and corresponding data such as average speed or travel time is shown only for the high level segments. In the detail view, a segment is shown broken into smaller sub-segments, and the user can view data at the level of the sub-segments. In addition to displaying traffic data and images, the user interface allows a user to find a shortest-time route between designated locations.

Claims

1. A user interface for depiction on a graphical display surface, comprising:

an interactive road map displayed on the graphical display surface;

a road image area concurrently displayed on the graphical display surface with the interactive road map;

wherein the road image area changes in response to user interactions with the interactive road map to show, concurrently with the interactive road map, recent camera scenes of road segments corresponding to selections made by the user on the interactive road map.

2. A user interface as recited in claim 1, wherein the recent camera scenes shown in the road image area are recent video clips of road segments corresponding to selections made by the user on the interactive road map.

3. A computer and associated display device, the computer being programmed to implement the user interface of claim 1.

4. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for implementing the user interface of claim 1 in conjunction with a display device having a graphical display surface.

5. A user interface as recited in claim 1, wherein the recent camera scenes shown in the road image area are still images of road segments corresponding to selections made by the user on the interactive road map.

6. A user interface as recited in claim 1, the user interface accepting a starting location and a destination location from the user and in response indicating a shortest-time route from the starting location to the destination location based on current travel times.

7. A user interface as recited in claim 1, further comprising a traffic description relevant to a particular road segment corresponding to a particular selection made by the user on the interactive road map.

8. A user interface as recited in claim 7, wherein the traffic description includes the current average speed for the particular road segment.

9. A user interface as recited in claim 7, wherein the traffic description includes the current travel time for the particular road segment.

10. A user interface as recited in claim 7, wherein the traffic description can be designated by the user to include at least one of the current travel time and the current average speed for the particular road segment.

11. A user interface as recited in claim 1, the user interface being responsive to a command from the user to show a detail map of a particular road segment wherein the detail map includes road sub-segments of the particular road segment.

12. A user interface for depiction on a graphical display surface, comprising:

an interactive road map displayed on the graphical display surface;

a road image area concurrently displayed on the graphical display surface with the interactive road map;

wherein the road image area changes in response to user interactions with the interactive road map to show recent images of road segments corresponding to selections made by the user on the interactive road map; and

wherein the interactive road map shows a plurality of road segments that are interactively selectable by the user, wherein the recent images shown in the road image area are images of a currently selected road segment.

13. A user interface for depiction on a graphical display surface, comprising:

an interactive road map displayed on the graphical display surface;

a road image area concurrently displayed on the graphical display surface with the interactive road map;

wherein the road image area changes in response to user interactions with the interactive road map to show recent images of road segments corresponding to selections made by the user on the interactive road map; and

wherein different recent images of a particular road segment are cycled in the road image area corresponding to a selection made by the user on the interactive road map.

14. A user interface for depiction on a graphical display surface;

comprising;

an interactive road map displayed on the graphical display surface;

a road image area concurrently displayed on the graphical display surface with the interactive road map;

wherein the road image area changes in response to user interactions with the interactive road map to show recent images of road segments corresponding to selections made by the user on the interactive road map; and

the user interface being responsive to a command from the user to cycle at defined intervals historical images of a particular road segment in the road image area corresponding to a selection made by the user on the interactive road map.

15. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

obtaining current traffic data for a plurality of road segments;

displaying an interactive road map to a user on a graphical display surface;

displaying a road image area concurrently with the interactive road map on the graphical display surface;

allowing a user to interact with the interactive road map to make selections;

displaying recent camera scenes of road segments in the road image area corresponding to the selections made by the user on the interactive road map.

16. A computer-readable medium as recited in claim 15 wherein the recent images are recent video clips corresponding to the selections made by the user on the interactive road map.

17. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

obtaining current traffic data for a plurality of road segments;

displaying an interactive road map to a user on a graphical display surface;

displaying a road image area concurrently with the interactive road map on the graphical display surface;

allowing a user to interact with the interactive road map to make selections by allowing a user to interactively select road segments from a plurality of road segments displayed on the interactive road map; and

displaying recent images of a currently selected road segment in the road image area and displaying recent images of road segments in the road image area corresponding to the selections made by the user on the interactive road map.

18. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

obtaining current traffic data for a plurality of road segments;

displaying an interactive road map to a user on a graphical display surface;

displaying a road image area concurrently with the interactive road map on the graphical display surface;

allowing a user to interact with the interactive road map to make selections;

displaying recent images of road segments in the road image area corresponding to the selections made by the user on the interactive road map;

wherein the recent images are recent video clips corresponding to a particular selection made by the user on the interactive road map, the computer-readable medium having further instructions for performing an additional step of cycling historical video clips of a particular road segment at defined intervals in response to a user'"'"'s request.

19. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

obtaining current traffic data for a plurality of road segments;

displaying an interactive road map to a user on a graphical display surface;

displaying a road image area concurrently with the interactive road map on the graphical display surface;

allowing a user to interact with the interactive road map to make selections;

displaying recent images of road segments in the road image area corresponding to the selections made by the user on the interactive road map;

cycling different recent images of a particular road segment corresponding to a particular selection made by the user.

20. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

obtaining current traffic data for a plurality of road segments;

displaying an interactive road map to a user on a graphical display surface;

displaying a road image area concurrently with the interactive road map on the graphical display surface;

allowing a user to interact with the interactive road map to make selections;

displaying recent images of road segments in the road image area corresponding to the selections made by the user on the interactive road map;

cycling historical images of a particular road segment corresponding to a particular selection made by the user at defined intervals.

21. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

obtaining current traffic data for a plurality of road segments;

displaying an interactive road map to a user on a graphical display surface;

displaying a road image area concurrently with the interactive road map on the graphical display surface;

allowing a user to interact with the interactive road map to make selections;

displaying recent images of road segments in the road image area corresponding to the selections made by the user on the interactive road map; and

displaying a traffic description relevant to a particular road segment corresponding to a particular selection made by the user.

22. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

obtaining current traffic data for a plurality of road segments;

displaying an interactive road map to a user on a graphical display surface;

displaying a road image area concurrently with the interactive road map on the graphical display surface;

allowing a user to interact with the interactive road map to make selections;

displaying recent images of road segments in the road image area corresponding to the selections made by the user on the interactive road map;

displaying a traffic description relevant to a particular road segment corresponding to a particular selection made by the user; and

deriving the current average speed for the particular road segment from the traffic data, the traffic description indicating said current average speed.

23. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method comprising:

obtaining current traffic data for a plurality of road segments;

displaying an interactive road map to a user on a graphical display surface;

displaying a road image area concurrently with the interactive road map on the graphical display surface;

allowing a user to interact with the interactive road map to make selections;

displaying recent images of road segments in the road image area corresponding to the selections made by the user on the interactive road map;

displaying a traffic description relevant to a particular road segment corresponding to a particular selection made by the user; and

deriving the current travel time for the particular road segment from the current traffic data, the traffic description indicating said current travel time.

24. A traffic information system comprising:

a plurality of sensors indicating speeds on sub-segments of public roads;

a plurality of cameras focused on said road sub-segments;

a server computer connected and programmed to gather data from the sensors and images from the cameras;

a plurality of client devices configured to receive sensor data and camera images from the server computer;

a display device associated with each client device;

each client device being programmed to display an interactive road map to a user on the display device, the interactive road map showing a plurality of road segments, each road segment comprising a plurality of road sub-segments;

the client device being further programmed to display recent camera scenes of the road sub-segments from the cameras concurrently with the interactive road map on the display device in response to selections made by the user on the interactive road map.

25. A traffic information system as recited in claim 24, wherein the cameras provide video images of said road sub-segments, the server computer being configured to acquire still images at periodic intervals to provide to the client devices on demand.

26. A traffic information system as recited in claim 24, wherein the cameras provide video images of said road sub-segments, the server computer being configured to acquire video clips at periodic intervals to provide to the client devices on demand.

27. A traffic information system, comprising:

a plurality of sensors indicating speeds on sub-segments of public roads;

a plurality of cameras focused on said road sub-segments;

a server computer connected and programmed to gather data from the sensors and images from the cameras;

a plurality of client devices configured to receive sensor data and camera images from the server computer;

a display device associated with each client device;

each client device being programmed to display an interactive road map to a user on the display device, the interactive road map showing a plurality of road segments, each road segment being interactively selectable by the user, and each road segment comprising a plurality of road sub-segments;

the client device being further programmed to display recent images of the road sub-segments from the cameras concurrently with the interactive road map on the display device in response to selections made by the user on the interactive road map; and

the client device being further programmed to display recent images of the road sub-segments from the cameras concurrently with the interactive road map on the display device in response to the user selecting such road sub-segments.