Bus stop display system

Abstract

To achieve a system for displaying an arriving vehicle even on a small-scale route at low cost.SOLUTION: The stop display system of the present invention displays a position and an estimated time of arrival of a bus at a non-powered type bus stop by directly distributing data to a bus stop from a bus vehicle by a terminal of a LoRa communication method having low power consumption characteristics, and reduces power consumption and operation cost (communication charge) of the terminal by performing transmission near the bus stop by using a mode in which a range of update of a time table is narrow but transfer is fast.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 3

Description

[Technical field]

[0001] The present invention relates to a system for transmitting information including the position of a traveling public vehicle to an information terminal at a bus stop, and displaying the vehicle's position and estimated arrival time. [Background technology]

[0002] The following equipment is typically installed on route buses: 1) A public address system that memorizes the stops scheduled for a bus trip and announces the name of the next stop to passengers. The announcement is activated by the driver. 2) A drive recorder that records video from inside and outside the vehicle. A tachograph that records time, speed, and distance traveled. Some are integrated with a drive recorder. A GPS antenna is usually connected to the drive recorder to record location information. 3) Equipment for the bus location system to grasp the location of vehicles under the control of the office. It has a GPS antenna and a wireless communication device. In some cases, this function is realized by attaching a wireless communication device to the drive recorder. The above 1) and 2) are currently installed in almost all vehicles, but 3) is still in the process of becoming more widespread.

[0003] Conventionally, a system that displays vehicle information at bus stops requires the aforementioned bus location system device, and the bus stop's location information is sent from the bus stop office to the LTE terminal at the bus stop via a wireless communication network (currently an LTE communication network). Alternatively, the bus stop's LTE terminal generally accesses the vehicle location information in the bus stop's server. Indeed, prior patent literature has taken this approach. [Prior art documents] [Patent documents]

[0004] [Patent Document 1] JP 2014-10533 A [Patent Document 2] JP 2019-121289 A Summary of the Invention [Problem to be solved by the invention]

[0005] To display the estimated arrival time and vehicle location for each route at bus stops, An LTE terminal is required on the vehicle side, a bus location server on the sales office side, and an LTE terminal on the bus stop side, and monthly operating costs are incurred based on the communication charges to the wireless carrier for the number of LTE terminals. The sales office side also requires considerable equipment.

[0006] Generally, an LTE terminal requires approximately 1W (watt) of power when receiving, so in a system where the bus stop is unpowered and receives power from solar panels, if the displayed information needs to be updated frequently and communication is required constantly, the solar panels and storage batteries would need to be large-scale, resulting in huge equipment costs.

[0007] In small routes where most bus stops are simple, with only bus stop signs and timetables posted on poles, the cost of displaying estimated arrival times is too high. This proposal aims to realize a system that displays arriving vehicles at low cost, even on small routes. [Means for solving the problem]

[0008] The means for solving the problems of reducing the power consumption of the information terminals at the bus stops and reducing communication charges are described below.

[0009] In recent years, the Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) communication method has emerged, which allows for "long distance communication with low power consumption." LPWA types can be broadly divided into unlicensed band (specific low power radio) methods that do not require a license and wireless methods (LTE catM1) provided by communication carriers that require a license. This proposal describes the LoRa communication method as an example, which allows communication between edge devices in unlicensed bands with lower power consumption without incurring communication fees.

[0010] LoRa communication terminals consume very little power and do not incur fees to wireless operators, making it possible to operate unpowered information display terminals at bus stops at low cost. However, the sales office Or other locations The central server at the bus stop communicates with all the bus stop terminals. The method is outside the scope of the low-cost concept of this proposal. Therefore, we adopt a method to transmit location information directly from the moving bus to the bus stop. However, due to the constraints of the communication method, even in the most widely transmitting mode, the amount of data per transmission is 59 bytes, and the bit rate is 250bps. This proposal makes it possible to operate within this transmission rate.

[0011] Unlike when transmitting vehicle position information, updating the timetable involves a large amount of data. Figure 4 shows an example of a timetable, but due to restrictions on the communication method, it is difficult to update it as a "picture," so only the times for the changed parts are changed. For example, if there is a change in the 11:00 time slot, a command like the one in Figure 2 (example) is sent.

[0012] Unlike location information distribution, timetable updates are done right in front of the bus stop. The definition of the data rate for the LoRa method is shown in Figure 5. Since location information is distributed over a wide area, DR0 in the figure is used, but if in front of a bus stop, it is desirable to use the maximum rate possible for the wireless communication unit. It is possible that this can be done with normal operating vehicles without having to prepare a special vehicle for updates. DR0 to DR5 are common modes in the LoRa method, and for example, DR5 can transmit within 1 second. Effect of the Invention

[0013] According to this proposal, it will be possible to implement and operate at low cost the display of the position and estimated arrival time of the next arriving bus at unpowered bus stops with a small number of routes. [Brief description of the drawings]

[0014] [Figure 1]Example of location information distribution data for a public transport vehicle [Diagram 2] Example of data to send when updating bus stop timetables [Diagram 3] Overall Systems Diagram [Figure 4] Example of bus stop display terminal [Diagram 5] LoRa Data Rate Definition DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS EXAMPLES

[0015] Figure 3 shows the overall system diagram. Three bus stops are depicted, and this is intended to show on the display terminal at bus stop 1 the position and estimated arrival time of bus vehicle 4 traveling between stop 1 and stop 3, which is two stops before.

[0016] The equipment mounted on the bus is shown in the vehicle-mounted device side 12 in Fig. 3. The vehicle side is equipped with a drive recorder 14 connected to a GPS antenna 15 as standard, and a bus stop name broadcasting device 13 that stores bus stop names and travel itineraries. In this example, a LoRa antenna 18 and a LoRa communication module 17 are connected to the bus stop name broadcasting device 13, and the bus stop name broadcasting device 13 controls the LoRa communication module 17 to transmit the location information shown in Fig. 1 to the bus stop based on the travel itinerary and latitude and longitude information obtained from the drive recorder 14, or the distance from the previous stop calculated from the vehicle speed pulse 16.

[0017] Since the bus stop name broadcasting device 13 stores the operation schedule, it is possible to send the location information shown in Fig. 1 to only bus stop 1 and bus stop 2. It is also possible to send the information by broadcasting without limiting the destination. In that case, the data received by the bus stop side is selected and displayed based on the route number and bus stop number.

[0018] An example of location information transmission data is shown in Figure 1. When transmitting from a moving vehicle that passes in front of a radio wave shielding object, it is necessary for the transmitting terminal to transmit as little data as possible frequently. The minimum information required is the route number, vehicle number, and vehicle position. The vehicle number is not necessarily required, but it is included in case vehicles are traveling overlapping each other.

[0019] The explanation of Figure 1 "Example 1 of location information transmission data from vehicle" is given below. What should be displayed at bus stops is how far the vehicle is between stops, and because the distance between stops is known in advance, a number is defined for every stop on the route, and the distance between stops is divided into 10 parts, so that if the vehicle is 3 / 10ths of the way between stop 36 and stop 37, for example, the five bytes 036.3 are sent. This method is possible with the bus stop name broadcasting unit 13 in Figure 3.

[0020] However, if the stop name broadcasting device 13 is made by another company, this function cannot be added, so the LoRa communication module in Figure 3 distributes location information obtained from the GPS antenna 15. This format is shown in "Example 2 of location information transmission data from vehicle." The route number and vehicle number are obtained from the stop name broadcasting unit 13. Even if the stop name broadcasting device 13 is manufactured by another company, the route number and vehicle number can be obtained through an interface of the communication standard of the Japan Automobile Body Industries Association (JAB). This example data includes the route number, vehicle number, and latitude and longitude information from GPS. The length increases from 16 bytes in data example 1 to 28 bytes in data example 2.

[0021] The display device at the bus stop determines the route number from the received information, and if the route number is the target route number and the bus stop number that should be displayed, displays a vehicle icon according to the position ratio. In the case of "Example 1 of location information transmission data from vehicle," the expected arrival time is displayed according to a comparison table of expected times that is predefined based on the ratio of stop numbers and locations. If the stop is farther away than it should be displayed, it will not be displayed.

[0022] In the case of "Example 2 of location information transmission data from vehicle," if the route number is the target, the latitude and longitude of the bus stop is compared with the received latitude and longitude information to calculate the distance, and the location of the nearby bus stop where the bus is currently traveling is calculated and displayed. The expected time is also displayed according to a comparison table of expected times that is specified in advance. If the bus stop is farther away than the one that should be displayed, it will not be displayed.

[0023] The components at the bus stop side are shown in Fig. 3, bus stop side 5. The power generated by solar cell 6 is stored in storage battery 7. A control microcomputer 8 appropriately selects the power from solar cell 6 and the power from storage battery 7 to power an electronic paper display unit 11 and a LoRa communication module 9 to which a LoRa antenna 10 is connected.

[0024] An example of the display on the electronic paper display of the bus stop in Figure 3 is shown in Figure 4. The location and estimated arrival time of the next bus for each route are displayed as an icon. Timetables for each route are displayed. If there is no bus within the four bus stops before the bus stop, there is no icon. The estimated arrival time is not displayed either.

[0025] Timetable updates are not done every day, so the following steps are followed. DR5 5475bps in Figure 5 is a data rate at which rewriting is completed when a vehicle in normal operation stops at a bus stop, but there is a possibility that transfer will fail if a vehicle passes by without getting on or off. In that case, instead of updating the timetables for all stops in one operation, a system is used in which data transfer for updates begins several days before the date of the timetable change, and the displays of the stops are all changed simultaneously on the date of the change according to the clocks in the display terminals of the stops. [Industrial Applicability]

[0026] A system that displays the estimated arrival time and current location of a bus at an unpowered bus stop can be realized at low cost. [Explanation of symbols]

[0027] 1 stop 1 2 stop 2 3 stop 3 4. Public bus 5. Bus stop terminal block diagram 6. Solar cells at bus stop terminals 7. Bus stop terminal batteries 8. Bus stop terminal control microcomputer 9. LoRa communication module for bus stop terminal 10 LoRa antenna at bus stop terminal 11. Electronic paper display unit of bus stop terminal 12. All on-board devices in the bus 13 Bus stop name announcement device 14. Drive recorder in bus 15 GPS antenna in bus 16 Bus speed pulse 17 LoRa communication module in the bus 18 LoRa antenna inside the bus

Claims

1. A bus stop information terminal comprising a display device having a solar cell, a storage battery for storing the power generated by the solar cell, and a means for appropriately selecting and receiving power from the solar cell and the storage battery, and a communication means to the display device being a communication device that does not require a radio station license, has variable communication speed and capacity, and is characterized by low power consumption, wherein the display content is transmitted directly to the bus stop information terminal using communication means that is slower in communication speed but capable of long-distance transmission from a route vehicle having a means for determining its position on the route, and the display system displays the predicted time of upcoming arrivals of vehicles and the current position of the vehicle using information that includes at least the route number and position information.

2. A bus stop information terminal as described in claim 1, wherein information that needs to be rewritten infrequently, such as changes to a timetable, is rewritten by directly transmitting it to the bus stop information terminal when a route vehicle having a means for grasping its position on the route reaches a position near a pre-defined location of the bus stop information terminal using a communication means which has a shorter communication distance but a faster communication speed than the communication means for transmitting the estimated arrival time and vehicle position information of the route vehicle as described in claim 1.

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