Providing Driving Condition Alerts Using Road Attribute Data

• US 20110043377A1
• Filed: 08/24/2009
• Published: 02/24/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 08/24/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: HERE Global B.V. (Nokia Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Navteq North America LLC (Nokia Corporation)
• Inventors: McGrath, Timothy A., Lindsay, Matthew G.
• Granted Patent: US 9,552,726 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 340/905
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/52 Surveillance or monitoring of activities, e.g. for recognising suspicious objects recognising microscopic objects G06V20/69
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/54 of traffic, e.g. cars on the road, trains or boats
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/008 communicating information to a remotely located station transmission systems for measured values G08C
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/09675 where a selection from the received information takes place in the vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/096775 where the origin of the information is a central station

Abstract

A method and system for providing a driving condition alert to vehicle drivers and others are disclosed. The alert is provided based on road location and attribute data; real-time, historic, and forecast traffic data; real-time, historic, and forecast weather data; and/or scheduled and unscheduled event data. The alert may include information indicating the reason for the alert provided. In addition, the alert may include a relative scale of hazard (e.g., a scale of 1-10 with 1 representing no hazard and 10 representing the highest hazardous condition). As a result of receiving the alert, the driver may adjust their route or driving behavior.

Claims

1. A method for providing driving condition alerts using road attribute data stored in a geographic database, comprising:

obtaining road location data, road attribute data, and at least one of traffic data, weather data, and event data, wherein the road attribute data and the at least one of traffic data, weather data, and event data are associated with the road location data;

analyzing the road attribute data with the other obtained data to determine whether an alertable condition exists; and

transmitting a driving condition alert if an alertable condition exists.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the road attribute data includes data that represents features of a road that can impact driving conditions.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the road attribute data includes data representing a shape of the road.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the shape of the road includes slope of the road.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the shape of the road includes elevation of the road.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein the shape of the road includes grade of the road.

7. The method of claim 2, wherein the road attribute data includes data representing lane characteristics of the road.

8. The method of claim 2, wherein the road attribute data includes data representing regulations associated with the road.

9. The method of claim 2, wherein the road attribute data includes data representing road type.

10. The method of claim 2, wherein the road attribute data includes data representing warning signs located adjacent to the road.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the traffic data includes real-time, forecast, and historic traffic data.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the weather data includes real-time, forecast, and historic weather data.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the event data includes data representing scheduled and unscheduled civic, social, and sporting events.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein analyzing the road attribute data with the other obtained data includes using a data baseline to start the analysis.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the data baseline is organized by location and time.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein for each location, the data baseline includes the road attribute data.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein for each time for a location, the data baseline includes historic traffic data and historic weather data.

18. The method of claim 1, further comprising calculating a score representative of driving conditions and transmitting the score with the driving condition alert.

19. A system for providing driving condition alerts using road attribute data stored in a geographic database, comprising in combination:

a processor;

data storage; and

machine language instructions stored in the data storage executable by the processor to;

obtain road location data, road attribute data, and at least one of traffic data, weather data, and event data, wherein the road attribute data and the at least one of traffic data, weather data, and event data are associated with the road location data;

analyze the road attribute data with the other obtained data to determine whether an alertable condition exists; and

transmit a driving condition alert if an alertable condition exists.

20. A system for providing driving condition alerts using road attribute data stored in a geographic database, comprising in combination:

a receiver for receiving real-time traffic data, forecast traffic data, real-time weather data, forecast weather data, and event data;

a data store for storing the real-time traffic data, the forecast traffic data, the real-time weather data, the forecast weather data, the event data, historic traffic data, historic weather data, and map data, wherein the map data includes road location data and road attribute data;

a driving condition application having routines to analyze the data in the data store and determine whether an alertable driving condition exists, wherein the determination is made using at least the road attribute data in combination with at least one of the traffic, the weather, and the event data;

a processor that executes the driving condition application; and

a transmitter for transmitting driving condition alert messages when the driving condition application determines that an alertable driving condition exists.