JP2005293071A - Automatic charge collection system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To realize an automatic charge collection system which can be relatively easily shifted from the configuration of a toll booth in a status quo while suppressing introduction costs. <P>SOLUTION: This automatic charge collection system is configured of a on-vehicle unit for storing traveling path information on the pay road of a vehicle by comparing location information from a GPS receiver with the location information of a pay road and road side equipment communicatively connected to the on-vehicle unit by radio for performing charging processing based on the traveling path information. When the approach of the vehicle is detected by a detecting means, the on-vehicle unit is accessed by the road side equipment, and the accessed on-vehicle unit transmits traveling path information stored by a traveling path storage means to the road side equipment, and a charging processing means executes charging processing based on the received traveling path information. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2006,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to an automatic fee collection system for automatically collecting a usage fee from a vehicle traveling on a toll road.

An automatic fee is provided at the entrance of a toll road, which is equipped with a gate for wireless communication with a predetermined vehicle-mounted device mounted on the vehicle, and the toll of the toll road is automatically collected from the owner of the vehicle by wireless communication with these gates. A collection system (a so-called ETC system (Electronic Toll Collection System)) has been proposed and put into practical use in recent years (see, for example, Patent Document 1).
JP 2002-42191 A

  In this ETC system, first, when a vehicle enters a toll road, that is, when it passes through an ETC-dedicated gate in a toll gate, the vehicle-mounted device and the gate perform wireless communication. At this time, information on the gate that has passed, in other words, information on the point where the vehicle entered the toll road, is stored in the IC card inserted into the vehicle-mounted device.

  Next, when the vehicle leaves the toll road, that is, when it passes through an ETC dedicated gate in the toll gate, the vehicle-mounted device and the gate perform wireless communication again. At this time, the vehicle-mounted device transmits the ID information of the owner of the vehicle to the gate together with the information on the point stored in the IC card.

  Based on the information received from the vehicle, the gate performs a billing process for the vehicle and displays the charge on a display provided beside the gate. Further, the gate transmits the processing result and ID information to the credit card company. The credit card company deducts the toll road usage fee from a financial institution designated by the owner of the vehicle based on the received information.

  As described above, in order to configure this ETC system, it is necessary to install ETC dedicated gates at both the entrance and exit of the toll road. However, a large amount of cost is required only by installing one ETC-dedicated gate, and there are many places to be installed. In addition, since vehicles that use toll roads constantly come and go at the toll gate, there is a time restriction in installing the gate. In other words, from the viewpoint of time constraints and cost, enormous time and cost must be spent in order to shift from the form of the current toll booth where personnel are deployed to the form of the ETC system.

  SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In view of the above circumstances, an object of the present invention is to provide an automatic fee collection system that can reduce the introduction cost and can be shifted relatively easily from the form of the current toll gate.

  An automatic toll collection system according to an aspect of the present invention that solves the above problems includes a GPS receiver for acquiring position information, road information corresponding to the position information by the GPS receiver, and information on at least a toll road Including the road information including the road information, the road information and the position information to determine whether or not the vehicle is located on the toll road, and on the toll road of the vehicle according to the determination result of the judgment means A vehicle equipped with a wireless communication-equipped vehicle-mounted device having travel route storage means for storing travel route information, and a roadside device installed at each exit of a toll road, capable of wireless communication, A roadside machine having a detecting means for detecting and a roadside machine having a charging processing means for performing a charging process based on travel route information. When the detecting means detects the approach of the vehicle, the roadside machine is mounted on the vehicle. Accessing, accessed OBE, a travel route information accumulated by the travel route accumulation unit is transmitted to the roadside device, accounting processing unit executes an accounting process based on the received traveling route information. When the system of the present invention is adopted, the vehicle-mounted device automatically acquires information on the entrance of the toll road, so that it is not necessary to install a gate at the entrance of the toll road. Accordingly, it is possible to reduce the introduction cost of a system that automatically collects charges, and relatively easily shift from the form of the current toll gate.

  In the automatic fare collection system, the travel route accumulation means accumulates the travel route information when the road information and the position information match.

  In the automatic fee collection system, the vehicle-mounted device terminates the accumulation process when the coincidence between the road information and the position information is interrupted for longer than a predetermined time during the accumulation of the travel route information.

  Further, in the automatic fare collection system, when the road information and the position information do not match during the accumulation of the travel route information, the vehicle-mounted device continues the accumulation process if the information matches each other within a predetermined time.

  The automatic fee collection system may further include a fee collection center connected to the roadside machine via a network. At this time, the vehicle-mounted device further has ID information, and the vehicle-mounted device accessed by the roadside device transmits the ID information to the roadside device, and the roadside device transmits the ID information together with the charging processing result to the toll collection center. Then, the fee collection center transmits information including the invoice to the owner of the vehicle based on the received processing result and ID information.

  In the automatic toll collection system, the information on the toll road is information on a position where the toll road is laid.

  In the automatic toll collection system, the information about the toll road further includes position information of the entrance / exit of the toll road, and the position information includes recognition information that allows the determination means to recognize the entrance / exit.

  As described above, according to the information collection system of the present invention, a roadside machine, that is, a gate may be installed only at the exit of the toll road in order to obtain information on the toll road usage fee from the vehicle-mounted device. Therefore, in constructing this system, the introduction cost can be kept relatively low. Further, since the number of gates to be installed is minimized, the transition from the current toll gate system to this system can be performed relatively easily.

  FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of an automatic fee collection system 500 according to an embodiment of the present invention. Hereinafter, the configuration and operation of the automatic fee collection system 500 will be described with reference to FIG.

  The automatic fare collection system 500 of this embodiment includes a vehicle equipped with the vehicle-mounted device 100, a roadside device 200 that is wirelessly communicable with the vehicle-mounted device 100, installed at each exit of a toll road, and the roadside device 200. And a toll collection center 300 connected by a wired network. In practice, there are many vehicles that use this system, but in the present specification, only one vehicle on which the vehicle-mounted device 100 is mounted is shown, and the description is simplified. Moreover, although this system is comprised from many roadside machines, it shall show only the roadside machine 200 for the same reason. Further, in this system, the toll collection center connected to these many roadside devices through a wired network is only the toll collection center 300, but in other embodiments, a plurality of such centers may be installed. First, the vehicle-mounted device 100 constituting the system will be described.

  The automatic toll collection system 500 uses the in-vehicle device mounted on each vehicle, thereby reducing the number of gate installation points for collecting the tolls that are normally installed at the entrance and exit of the toll road. It is a system that fulfills the function of automatically collecting usage fees from users. By adopting this system 500, the introduction cost of the automatic collection system can be kept relatively low. It is also possible to transfer the system relatively easily from the current tollgate system.

  The vehicle-mounted device 100 includes a GPS (Global Positioning System) module 110, a system controller 120, map information 130, a travel route storage unit 140, and an IC tag 150.

  The GPS module 110 has an antenna 112. The antenna 112 can capture a GPS signal transmitted from a well-known GPS satellite. A GPS signal captured by the antenna 112 is input to the GPS module 110. The GPS module 110 extracts GPS data such as Ephemeris from the input GPS signal and performs geometric calculation based on the pseudorange and orbit information obtained for a plurality of GPS satellites. That is, the position of the vehicle is calculated and output to the system controller 120. At this time, the position information of the vehicle calculated by the GPS module 110 is expressed by, for example, WGS-84 system coordinates. The WGS-84 system coordinates are converted into, for example, Japanese geodetic system coordinates by the system controller 120.

  The map information 130 is a memory that stores position information of toll roads spread in each area. The toll road position information stored in the map information 130 is, for example, position information based on Japanese geodetic coordinates (that is, coordinates consisting of three axes). More specifically, this position information is obtained by sampling the position where the toll road is laid at predetermined intervals along the vehicle traveling direction, and expressing the position information of each sampled point by the coordinates of the above system. is there.

  Further, the map information 130 stores coordinates corresponding to the entrance / exit of the toll road, that is, position information. Further, the position information of the entrance / exit includes recognition information that makes the system controller 120 recognize that fact. Note that the map information 130 is not limited to the position information described above, and may include position information of a general road that is a road other than a toll road. In this case, the map information 130 further includes information for distinguishing the toll road from the general road in the position information of each road.

  The system controller 120 always determines whether or not position information corresponding to the current position information of the vehicle output from the GPS module 110 is stored in the map information 130. That is, the system controller 120 always compares the current position information of the vehicle with the position information stored in the map information 130. Further, as described above, the position information corresponding to the entrance of the toll road stored in the map information 130 includes entrance recognition information that causes the system controller 120 to recognize that fact. Therefore, when the vehicle reaches the entrance of the toll road, the system controller 120 detects the position information corresponding to the entrance of the toll road and reads the entrance recognition signal for recognizing that the current position is the entrance of the toll road. Recognize that the vehicle has entered a toll road. When the vehicle reaches the exit of the toll road, the system controller 120 similarly reads an exit recognition signal that recognizes that the current position is the exit of the toll road, and recognizes that the vehicle has exited the toll road. To do.

  After recognizing that the vehicle has entered the toll road, the system controller 120 continues to compare the current position information of the vehicle output by the GPS module 110 with the toll road position information stored in the map information 130. Do. And when these position information corresponds, it determines with the vehicle drive | working the toll road.

  The travel route storage unit 140 is a memory in which travel route information of vehicles on toll roads is stored. More specifically, when it is determined that the vehicle is traveling on a toll road, the system controller 120 reads position information of the toll road corresponding to the current travel route from the map information 130, and the read position Information is written in the travel route storage unit 140. Therefore, while the vehicle is traveling on the toll road, information on the travel route is accumulated in the travel route accumulation unit 140.

  The IC tag 150 is a small chip, and includes a memory 152, a communication unit 154, and a controller 156. The memory 152 is a memory that stores ID information related to the owner of the vehicle on which the vehicle-mounted device 100 is mounted. The ID information here is, for example, the name, address, e-mail address, account number, vehicle type, etc. of the owner of the vehicle. The communication unit 154 is a communication interface for performing wireless communication with an external device. In the present embodiment, the communication unit 154 performs a function of performing wireless communication with the roadside device 200, and uses the ID information stored in the memory 152 and the travel route information stored in the travel route storage unit 140. Can be sent to. The controller 156 performs signal processing control in the IC tag 150, and functions to read the ID information from the memory 152 and wirelessly communicate with an external device using the communication unit 154. Next, the roadside machine 200 which comprises this system is demonstrated.

  The roadside machine 200 is a gate installed at each exit of the toll road for collecting tolls, and includes a communication unit 210, a vehicle detection unit 220, a billing processing unit 230, and a system controller 240. Yes.

  The communication unit 210 is a communication interface for performing wireless communication with an external device. In the present embodiment, the communication unit 210 performs a function of performing wireless communication with the vehicle-mounted device 100.

  The vehicle detection part 220 is comprised, for example with the infrared sensor, and can detect the approach of the vehicle with respect to the roadside machine 200. Specifically, when the vehicle enters an area in front of the roadside machine 200, the vehicle detection unit 220 detects the approach of the vehicle. At this time, the vehicle detection unit 220 outputs the detection signal to the system controller 240.

  The charging processing unit 230 can calculate a toll road usage fee for the vehicle based on the travel route information transmitted from the vehicle-mounted device 100. The information on the travel route is information on the travel route of the vehicle on the toll road accumulated in the travel route accumulation unit 140 described above.

  The billing processing unit 230 includes a table 232 that stores toll road charges in each section, and a calculation unit 234 that calculates the usage fee based on the table 232 and travel route information. Based on the travel route information transmitted from the vehicle-mounted device 100, the calculation unit 234 searches the table 232 for the charge of the section that matches the travel route information, and the charge that matches the travel route information. When the information is detected, the fee information is output to the system controller 240.

  The system controller 240 manages signal processing control of the roadside device 200. The signal processing control by the system controller 240 will be specifically described below.

  For example, when the detection signal indicating the approach of the vehicle is output from the vehicle detection unit 220, the system controller 240 is triggered by the input of the detection signal to the vehicle-mounted device of the vehicle via the communication unit 210. A signal requesting the ID information and the travel route information is transmitted.

  When the toll road fee information for the vehicle is output from the billing processing unit 230, the system controller 240 displays the toll information on the display unit 250 and collects the toll information via the communication unit 210. Send to center 300. In addition, the display part 250 is provided in the position where it is easy to observe from the passenger of a vehicle. That is, the vehicle occupant can confirm the usage fee of his / her toll road through the display unit 250. Moreover, such a display part may be provided in the onboard equipment 100 instead of the roadside machine 200, for example. In this case, the system controller 240 transmits fee information to the vehicle-mounted device 100 through the communication unit 210 in addition to the ID information and the travel route information. Next, the fee collection center 300 constituting this system will be described.

  The toll collection center 300 is a facility that actually charges or collects a toll road usage fee from the owner of the vehicle, and is a credit card company, for example. The toll collection center 300 includes a communication unit 310, a database 320, and a system controller 330.

  The communication unit 210 is a communication interface for communicating with the roadside device 200, and the toll collection center 300 is connected to the roadside device 200 via the communication unit 210 via a wired network.

  The database 320 stores information on the owner of the vehicle equipped with the vehicle-mounted device as a database. The information stored in the database 320 is information corresponding to ID information stored in the memory of the IC tag of each vehicle-mounted device. For example, the name, address, e-mail address, account number of the vehicle owner, This includes the payment history of the vehicle type and toll road usage fees.

  The system controller 330 is in charge of signal processing control of the toll collection center 300. This system controller 330, based on the toll information transmitted from the roadside machine 200 and the ID information of the owner of the vehicle related to the toll information, the owner of the vehicle that matches the ID information from the database 320 Search for information. Based on the detected vehicle owner's information, the toll road usage fee is withdrawn from the owner's account, or the fee collection or invoice is sent to the owner by e-mail or mail. Can be.

  FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing travel route information processing performed by the vehicle-mounted device 100 according to the embodiment of the present invention. In this flowchart, the vehicle is shown on the premise that the vehicle is traveling on a general road in the first stage. The flowchart of FIG. 2 will be described below.

  The system controller 120 compares the current position information of the vehicle output from the GPS module 110 in real time with the position information stored in the map information 130, and the position that matches the current position information in the map information 130 It is checked whether there is information (step 1, hereinafter referred to as S1). If the current position information matches the position information in the map information 130 and the matching position information includes entrance recognition information indicating that it is an entrance of a toll road, the system controller 120 indicates that the vehicle is charged. Recognizing that the road has been entered (S1: Y), the process proceeds to S2. At this time, if the matched position information does not include the entrance recognition information, the system controller 120 continues the check (S1: N).

  When recognizing that the vehicle has entered the toll road, the system controller 120 compares the current position information from the GPS module 110 with the toll road position information stored in the map information 130 (S2). At this time, if the mutual position information matches (S2: Y), the system controller 120 reads the matching toll road position information from the map information 130, and writes the read position information to the travel route accumulation unit 140 (S3). ), Return to S2. By repeating the steps S2 and S3, the travel route information on the toll road of the vehicle is accumulated in the travel route accumulating unit 140. If the mutual position information does not match (S2: N), the process proceeds to S4.

  In S3, if the current position information of the vehicle and the position information of the toll road in the map information 130 do not match, whether the vehicle is located at one of the entrance, exit, or general road of the toll road, Or it corresponds to any of the errors included in the GPS signal.

  In S4, when the current position information of the vehicle matches the position information including exit recognition information indicating that it is an exit of a toll road stored in the map information 130, the system controller 120 Recognizing that the vehicle has left the toll road (S4: Y), the process proceeds to S5. In other cases, that is, when the system controller 120 does not read the exit recognition information (S4: N), the process proceeds to S6.

  In S5, since the vehicle has reached the exit of the toll road, the vehicle will pass the roadside machine 200 installed at the exit. When the vehicle passes through the roadside machine 200, the roadside machine 200 requests ID information and travel route information from the vehicle. Therefore, the system controller 120 transmits the ID information and the travel route information to the roadside device 200 based on the request signal (S5), and ends the process.

  In S6, the system controller 120 counts the time when the current position information of the vehicle and the position information of the toll road in the map information 130 do not match, and if the position information matches each other within a predetermined time, the system controller 120 In the process, it is determined that the GPS signal includes an error (S6: Y), and the process returns to S2. If the positional information does not match even after a predetermined time has elapsed, for example, it is determined that there is an error in the previous step such as S1 (S6: N), and the process is terminated. The predetermined time is a short time that is less than one second, for example.

  As described above, the ID information and the travel route information are transmitted from the vehicle-mounted device 100 to the roadside device 200, the fee is calculated in the roadside device 200, and the fee collection center 300 performs processing such as automatic debiting according to the fee. .

  In addition, when the vehicle travels on a route (for example, under an elevated road or a tunnel) where the GPS module 110 may not be able to receive a GPS signal, the information on the route can be supplemented with a predetermined algorithm. Hereinafter, a method for complementing vehicle travel route information on the route will be described.

  The vehicle-mounted device 100 stores position information under a road overpass or a tunnel in the map information 130. If the vehicle becomes unable to receive a GPS signal immediately after passing through a position corresponding to the above-described position information, a position under the overpass or a position corresponding to the entrance of the tunnel, the system controller 120 may indicate an error or the vehicle Is determined to have entered the underpass or tunnel. Then, the GPS signal can be received again at the position corresponding to the position where the vehicle enters under the overpass or the position corresponding to the entrance of the tunnel (that is, the position passing under the overpass or the position corresponding to the exit of the tunnel). In this case, the system controller 120 determines that the vehicle has traveled under an overpass or a tunnel, and stores the information in the travel route storage unit 140 so as to supplement the information on the route that could not be received. In addition, when the vehicle goes out to a position different from the corresponding position and receives a GPS signal, the system controller 120 determines that an error has occurred. That is, according to the above-described determination method, the vehicle-mounted device 100 specifies a route between these two positions, that is, a position where reception is disabled and a position where reception is possible again. Note that the above-described determination process may be executed by replacing the vehicle-mounted device 100 with the fee collection center 300 and the map information 130 with the database 320.

  There is also a method of installing an antenna in a place where GPS signals cannot be received, such as under a road or on a tunnel. In this case, the GPS module 110 can receive a GPS signal via the antenna.

  The above is the embodiment of the present invention. The present invention is not limited to these embodiments and can be modified in various ranges.

  In the present embodiment, ID information and fee information are transmitted from the roadside device 200 to the toll collection center 300. In addition to these ID information and fee information, the roadside information is transmitted to the roadside information. Machine 200 may be set. According to this embodiment, the toll collection center 300 can analyze a traffic jam situation in each area of the toll road, for example, with reference to the received travel route information.

  In the present embodiment, the vehicle-mounted device 100 stores travel route information in the travel route storage unit 140, but may store only the entrance and exit of a toll road. In this embodiment, the information regarding the toll road which the onboard equipment 100 should memorize | store can be suppressed to the minimum.

It is a block diagram which shows the structure of the automatic fee collection system of embodiment of this invention. It is the flowchart which showed the driving | running route information processing performed with the onboard equipment of embodiment of this invention.

Explanation of symbols

100 on-vehicle device 110 GPS module 140 route information storage unit 150 IC tag 200 roadside device 300 toll collection center

Claims (7)

A GPS receiver for acquiring position information, road information corresponding to the position information by the GPS receiver, including road information including at least information on toll roads, and comparing the road information with the position information Wireless communication is possible having determination means for determining whether or not the vehicle is located on a toll road and travel route storage means for storing travel route information on the toll road of the vehicle according to the determination result of the determination means Vehicles equipped with various on-vehicle devices,
A roadside device installed at each exit of a toll road and capable of wireless communication, comprising: detecting means for detecting the approach of the vehicle; and charging processing means for performing charging processing based on the travel route information An automatic toll collection system comprising a roadside machine,
When the detection means detects the approach of the vehicle, the roadside device accesses the vehicle-mounted device,
The accessed vehicle-mounted device transmits the travel route information stored by the travel route storage means to the roadside device,
An automatic fee collection system, wherein the billing processing means executes billing processing based on the received travel route information.   2. The automatic fare collection system according to claim 1, wherein the travel route accumulation means accumulates the travel route information when the road information and the position information match.   3. The automatic fee according to claim 2, wherein when the coincidence between the road information and the position information is interrupted for a longer time than a predetermined time during the travel route information accumulation, the onboard device ends the accumulation process. Collection system.   When the road information and the position information do not match during the accumulation of the travel route information, the vehicle-mounted device continues the accumulation process when the pieces of information match within a predetermined time. The automatic fee collection system according to claim 2 or claim 3. An automatic toll collection system further comprising a toll collection center connected to the roadside machine through a network,
The on-vehicle device further includes ID information,
The vehicle-mounted device accessed by the roadside device transmits the ID information to the roadside device,
The roadside device transmits the ID information together with the charging processing result to a toll collection center,
The charge collection center transmits information including a bill to the owner of the vehicle based on the received processing result and the ID information. Automatic fee collection system.   6. The automatic toll collection system according to claim 1, wherein the information on the toll road is information on a position where the toll road is laid.   The information on the toll road further includes position information of an entrance / exit of the toll road, and the position information includes recognition information for causing the determination unit to recognize that it is the entrance / exit. 6. Automatic fee collection system according to 6.

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