School bus locator system

• US 5,144,301 A
• Filed: 02/19/1991
• Issued: 09/01/1992
• Est. Priority Date: 02/19/1991
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Infinity Ideas, LLC
• Original Assignee: Jeffrey G. Parks, Timothy C. Jackson
• Inventors: Jackson, Timothy C., Parks, Jeffrey G.
• Primary Examiner(s): Ng, Jin F.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Oda, Christine K.
• Application Number:
  US07/656,460
• Time in Patent Office: 560 Days
• Field of Search: 340/993, 340/994, 340/988, 340/964, 340/661, 340/691, 340/384 E, 340/511, 340/539
• US Class Current: 340/994
• 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

Abstract

A system for alerting school children that a school bus is moving toward a nearby bus stop, thus prompting the children to leave their residences to reach the bus stop at or before the bus arrives at the stop. The system includes a radio transmitter on the bus and a radio receiver in each home along the bus route. Each receiver has a first warning light that begins to emit a signal when the school bus is a relatively great distance away from the home, and a second sound-emitting speaker that begins to emit an audible signal when the school bus is a relatively short distance away from the home, e.g. one quarter mile.

Claims

1. A school bus locator system comprising a radio transmitter in a remote on-the-road school bus;

an individual radio receiver in each of the homes of school children;

said radio receiver being operable to generate an electric signal when the remote school bus is within a predetermined distance of said radio receiver;

a light emitting diode associated with said radio receiver to be energized to emit a light signal thereby when the remote bus is a predetermined geographical distance from said radio receiver;

an oscillator associated with said radio receiver in electrical parallelism with the light-emitting diode for generating audible beeper signals separate from the emitted light signal;

two separate speakers connected to said oscillator in electrical parallelism with each other for broadcasting separate beeper signals;

three separate adjustable resistance means connected to the light emitting diode and each of the two speakers to determine the minimum geographical spacing between the remote school bus and the radio receiver required for the light emitting diode to be energized and for the respective speakers to begin broadcasting;

a housing for said radio receiver, light-emitting diode oscillator, the separate speakers and said three separate adjustable resistance means;

the housing simulating the appearance of a miniature school bus;

the housing including a front wall and a bottom wall, said bottom wall comprising horizontal flat sections (27) simulating the undersurface of the miniature bus, and two spaced semi-circular sections (29) simulating lower surface areas of the miniature bus road wheels;

said housing front wall having two inset circular wall sections (31) simulating side surface areas of the miniature bus road wheels;

each of said speakers being located within the housing behind each of the two inset circular wall sections that form the simulated road wheels;

each said inset circular wall sections having a series of radial openings extending therethrough to simulate wheel spoke openings;

each of said speakers being oriented so that its beeper signal is directed through the associated spoke openings.