Emergency Vehicle Geofence Alerts With Dynamic Release Zones
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional emergency vehicle alert systems, relying on audio or visual signaling, often fail to ensure safety due to unnecessary alerts, ignorance, or lack of notice by distracted drivers or those with hearing impairments, and lack the ability to dynamically manage geofences as vehicles move.
Innovation Solution
A system and method for managing a geofence for emergency vehicles, using a receiver, processor, and transmitter to set up and clear geofences based on the vehicle's location, ensuring alerts are only provided to vehicles within the relevant area and ceasing alerts when the vehicle has passed through.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional audio or visual signaling devices are used to alert other vehicles, then emergency vehicle alerts are provided, but unnecessary alerts are given to vehicles not on the same road and alerts are easily ignored
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by creating a geofence that is specifically localized to the road segments where the emergency vehicle will travel. Instead of broadcasting alerts universally, the system defines a precise geographic boundary using coordinate data from mapping services, ensuring that only vehicles within the relevant local area receive alerts. This resolves the contradiction by making alerts locally relevant rather than universally distributed.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements dynamics by continuously updating the geofence as the emergency vehicle moves. The system receives real-time location data from the emergency vehicle, dynamically adjusts the geofence boundaries to match the vehicle's current position and intended route, and automatically clears the geofence when the vehicle has passed through an area. This dynamic approach ensures alerts are always relevant to the current situation while eliminating unnecessary alerts in areas the vehicle has already left.
2Reliability
If geofence is set up for emergency vehicle to provide alerts to nearby vehicles, then relevant vehicles receive accurate alerts, but the system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses an intermediary approach by introducing a server that acts as a mediator between the emergency vehicle and other vehicles. The server receives geofence setup requests from the emergency vehicle, processes the location data, defines the geofence boundaries using mapping service APIs, manages the geofence lifecycle, and distributes alerts to appropriate vehicles. This intermediary architecture simplifies the overall system complexity by centralizing the complex geofence management logic in a dedicated server rather than requiring complex peer-to-peer coordination between vehicles.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies segmentation by dividing the geofence management functionality into distinct modular components: (1) geofence definition module that creates boundaries from coordinate data, (2) alert distribution module that identifies and contacts vehicles within the geofence, and (3) geofence clearing module that removes expired geofences. This segmentation allows each component to be independently developed, tested, and maintained, reducing overall system complexity while maintaining high alert accuracy.
3Adaptability or versatility
If continuous geofence monitoring is performed to track emergency vehicle location, then dynamic geofence management is achieved, but energy consumption and processing load increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements periodic action by having the emergency vehicle transmit its location data to the server at regular intervals rather than continuously. The server receives these periodic location updates and accordingly updates the geofence boundaries and redistributes alerts. This periodic approach maintains dynamic geofence management capability while significantly reducing energy consumption and processing load compared to continuous monitoring and transmission.
Data Source
AI summary
A system, method and storage medium for providing an emergency vehicle (EV) alert includes a server receiving a first location of the EV, the server determining a first geofence based on the first location of the EV, the server transmitting the first geofence to a second device, the second device receiving the first geofence, the second device performing at least one alert action in response to determining that the another vehicle is located within the first geofence, the server receiving a second location of the EV at a second time, the server determining a geofence release zone based on the second location of the EV, the server transmitting the geofence release zone to the second device, the second device receiving the geofence release zone, and the second device stopping performing the at least one alert action in response to determining that the another vehicle is within the geofence release zone.