JP2000285389A - Travel management system for traveling object - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a travel management system for traveling object capable of quickly coping with congestion occurrence, etc. SOLUTION: A GPS receiver, etc., detects the current position, present time and speed of a traveling object on which a mobile station is mounted, e.g. a vehicle (100). When the current position coincides with a registered check point (102), a scheduled time when the traveling object starts or travels through the check point is compared with the detected present time (104), and a speed range that should be adopted at the check point is compared with the detected speed (106). In the case the delay of the present time from the scheduled time is outside an allowable error range and the detected speed is not within the range, information such as the current position, the present time and the speed is transmitted to a base station by radio (108). Even when delay due to congestion is expected even though delay does not occur at the present time, it can be detected as travel abnormality because the speeds are compared.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a mobile operation management system for managing the operation of mobile objects such as vehicles.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In the field of passenger transport such as route buses, taxis, trucks, and home delivery vehicles, in the field of tourism such as sightseeing buses, and in the field of commerce such as replenishment of goods to vending machines, it is used in the business. In general, how to achieve and improve the efficient and accurate management of a large number of vehicles has been a concern. Various technical means have been proposed to address this problem. Among them,
Attempts to at least partially automate the operation of various moving objects represented by vehicles used in these fields by using wireless communication technology and positioning technology are disclosed in, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 10-1.
In the form disclosed in Japanese Patent No. 49498, results have been produced.

[0003] The system described in the above-mentioned publication (hereinafter, "conventional system") manages vehicles such as regular flight trucks. This conventional system includes a mobile station mounted on each managed vehicle and a fixedly provided base station. Each mobile station and the base station are wirelessly connected by means such as a mobile phone. The mobile station, when a situation that does not satisfy the pre-registered scheduled operation conditions occurs, wirelessly reports the current situation to the base station, and the base station executes video display of information relating to the current situation of the mobile station or the vehicle. I do.

[0004] In the conventional system, the operation schedule conditions are registered as follows: information indicating a position of a departure point, a main transit point, a destination point, etc., information indicating a scheduled operation required time from the departure point to a registered position. ,. The determination as to whether or not the operation schedule condition is satisfied is made by, in addition to these registered information, information indicating a current position and a current time obtained from an onboard GPS (Global Positioning System) receiver, Perform based on. In the above-mentioned publication, in particular, in claim 4, the following three methods are shown as determination methods that can be adopted in the conventional system.

In the first method, first, the current time, that is, the departure time is measured by a GPS receiver at the time of departure. Further, the scheduled departure / arrival or passage time of each registered position is obtained by adding the registered scheduled operation required time and the departure time. After the departure, the comparison between the current position obtained from the GPS receiver and the registered position is executed at a predetermined frequency. As a result of this comparison, when it is detected that they match, the scheduled departure / arrival or passing time of the registered position is compared with the current time obtained from the GPS receiver. As a result, when it is detected that the scheduled departure or arrival time or the passing time + the predetermined allowable delay <the current time, it is determined that the operation of the mounted vehicle is delayed, and the base station is notified by radio.

In the second method, first, the current time, that is, the departure time is measured by a GPS receiver at the time of departure. After the departure, the comparison between the current position obtained from the GPS receiver and the registered position is executed at a predetermined frequency. As a result of this comparison, when it is detected that they match, the difference between the current time obtained from the GPS receiver and the departure time measured by the GPS receiver at the time of departure, that is, the actual operation time is obtained. Further, the actual operation required time thus obtained is compared with the registered scheduled operation required time. As a result, when it is detected that the registered scheduled operation required time + predetermined permissible delay <actual operation required time, it is considered that the operation of the loading destination vehicle has been delayed, and the base station is notified by radio.

In the third method, first, the current time, that is, the departure time is measured by a GPS receiver at the time of departure. Further, the scheduled departure / arrival or passage time of each registered position is obtained by adding the registered scheduled operation required time and the departure time. After departure, compare the current time obtained from the GPS receiver with the scheduled departure / arrival or passing time of each registered location.
Execute at a predetermined frequency. As a result of this comparison, when it is detected that they match, the current position obtained from the GPS receiver is compared with the corresponding registered position. as a result,
If it is detected that the remaining distance from the current position to the registered position> predetermined allowable error, it is determined that a delay has occurred in the operation of the vehicle on which the vehicle is mounted, and the base station is notified by radio.

[0008]

As a problem common to the three methods described in the above-mentioned methods, there is a problem that detection of an operation abnormality may be delayed.
For example, it is assumed that the vehicle on which the mobile station is mounted has been smoothly operated up to the registered position or its immediate vicinity, but has been caught in traffic congestion thereafter. In that case, any of the first to third methods described above cannot detect that the vehicle has been caught in traffic congestion as an operation abnormality at that time. The operation abnormality is detected when the vehicle reaches the next registered position (first and second methods) or when the scheduled departure / arrival or passing time of the next registered position arrives (third method). Method) until it is delayed.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, and reduces or eliminates a delay in detecting an operation abnormality due to the occurrence of traffic congestion. It is intended to realize a system with high performance.

[0010]

In order to achieve the above object, a mobile station according to the present invention has the following features. (1) The position of a checkpoint set on a scheduled movement route of the mobile station and the checkpoint Means for storing the speed or the range that the moving body should take at the point,
(2) means for detecting the position and speed of the own station during operation of the mobile unit; and (3) own station arriving or arriving at the checkpoint based on the contents of the storage and the result of the detection during operation of the mobile unit. Means for determining whether or not the determined speed matches the speed to be adopted or the range thereof, and (4) if it is determined that the speed does not match, wirelessly notifies the base station of the determination. And means are provided.

As described above, in the present invention, the speed at the check point is stored in the mobile station. Therefore,
Based on the current speed detected by means such as a GPS receiver and the stored speed at the checkpoint or its range, whether the current speed is normal, for example, whether the vehicle is caught in a traffic jam Can be detected. As a result, in the present invention, since the occurrence of traffic congestion and the like are also detected and the operation abnormality detection taking this into consideration is realized, the reliability of the operation abnormality detection is improved as compared with the conventional system.

Further, the present invention has various embodiments. For example, from a mobile station mounted on a mobile body to a fixedly disposed base station, when an operation abnormality in speed is notified wirelessly, the speed at which the mobile station arrives or departs or passes a checkpoint, It is better to report to the base station by radio. When the base station receives a radio report from the mobile station and notifies the surroundings of the occurrence of an operation abnormality in response to this,
Information on the speed can be used effectively. For example, if the mobile unit associated with the reporting mobile station is expected to arrive at its destination with a delay of at least a predetermined amount, or if it can be considered that the mobile unit is involved in a noticeable traffic jam, May be notified to the departure point or destination of the moving object or a user of the service related to the moving object. This type of treatment can be used, for example, in a system for managing vehicles that carry luggage, by notifying the destination of the luggage that the arrival has been delayed.

[0013] The present invention also relates to a mobile station.
It can also be grasped as an invention of a mobile operation management system using this.

[0014]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows the configuration of a mobile operation management system according to an embodiment of the present invention. The system shown in this figure is composed of a base station 10 which is fixedly arranged and a mobile station 20 which is mounted on a mobile object to be managed.
A plurality of mobiles may be managed, but here, for simplicity of illustration and simplification of description, only one managed mobile or mobile station 20 is assumed. In addition, any object that moves on the earth and requires scheduled operation can be managed by the system according to the present embodiment. Here, it is assumed that a vehicle that delivers a package to a customer is managed for the purpose of specific description.

The arithmetic processing and control functions of the base station 10 are exclusively performed by the mobile unit management processing unit 11.
The mobile object management processing unit 11 includes a storage unit 12 which is an external storage device or various memories, a member operated by a user, for example, an operation unit 13 which is a keyboard or various pointing devices, and a device such as a CRT or a liquid crystal. A display unit 14, an audio output unit 14a including various electronic sound sources and speakers, an interface 15 provided for connection with another information processing apparatus, an interface 16 provided for connection with a public line, a LAN, or the like. Etc. are connected.
The mobile unit management processing unit 11 and the members 12 to 16 connected thereto are provided by a personal computer (P
C) 17. A patrol light (lighting light source for alarm) may be provided instead of the audio output unit 14a. The interface 15 is an interface based on RS232C or the like. The interface 16 is used for facsimile, pager, and the like. Further, a wireless unit 18 is connected to the PC 17. The wireless unit 18 is a member for wirelessly connecting to the mobile station 20 via the antenna 19, and can be realized by, for example, a telephone-related device such as a mobile phone or a PHS, or a dedicated wireless device. In some cases, it may be in the form of a function expansion card of the PC 17 or the like.

The function of detecting the operation status of the own station in the mobile station 20 is executed exclusively under the control of the operation status detection unit 21 of the mobile station. The local station operation status detection unit 21 is connected to a storage unit 22 as various memories, an interface 23 provided for connection with another information processing device, and the like. The own-station operation status detecting unit 21 and the members 22 to 23 connected thereto can be realized by a PC similarly to the base station. Since the mobile station 20 is a device mounted on a vehicle or the like and is required to be small, light, and low in power consumption, it can be said that the mobile station 20 may be realized by the portable information terminal 24 or the like. The interface 23 is, for example, RS23.
2C compliant. The mobile station 20 further receives a signal from an artificial satellite using the antenna 28 and measures a current position, a current time, a moving speed, and the like of the own station based on the signal. Is provided with a wireless unit 27 that wirelessly connects to the base station 10 by using a wireless LAN. The wireless unit 27 can be implemented in the same manner as the wireless unit 18.

In the configuration shown in FIG. 1, two means for connecting the base station 10 and the mobile station 20 are prepared. One of them is a wireless connection between the wireless unit 18 and the wireless unit 27. The transmission (downlink) from the radio unit 18 to the radio unit 27 is performed, for example, in the storage unit 12 of the base station 10 or in the operation unit 13.
For the operation status judgment input from the mobile station 2
This is performed when downloading to the storage unit 22 within “0”. The transmission (uplink) from the wireless unit 27 to the wireless unit 18 is performed when the base station 20 is wirelessly notified of the operation abnormality of the vehicle on which the mobile station 20 is mounted. As means for connecting the base station 10 and the mobile station 20, there is a connection between the interface 15 and the interface 23 in addition to the wireless connection. For example, these interfaces 15 and 23 are interconnected when information for determining the operation status is downloaded to the storage unit 22 in the mobile station 20. The interfaces 15 and 23 are interfaces conforming to, for example, RS232C.

FIG. 2A shows the types of information used for determining the operation status in the present embodiment, particularly, the types of information downloaded from the base station 10 to the storage unit 22. As shown in this figure, consider a route that departs from position P0 and arrives at position P5. Further, four checkpoints at positions P1 to P4 (six places including the starting point = P0 and the destination point = P5) on this route are assumed. Further, the scheduled time at which the vehicle arrives or departs or passes through the positions P0 to P5 is t0
To t5, and speeds to be adopted when the vehicle passes the positions P1 to P4 are v1 to v4. The information downloaded to the storage unit 22 in the present embodiment includes the checkpoint positions P0 to P5, the scheduled times t0 to t5, and the velocities v1 to v4.
It is. Since the operation status determination in the present embodiment is performed independently for each time point, that is, it can be performed without referring to the travel history, information indicating whether each check point corresponds to a departure point, a destination point, or a passing point is provided. Need not be included in the download. For the positions P0 to P5, the position information obtained from the GPS receiver 25 is W
Since the latitude and longitude conform to GS84, it is desirable to use a format of latitude and longitude. Further, the speeds v1 to v4 may have the same value. Also, the speeds v1 to v
It is better to set the speed range of 4 to an allowable speed range instead of the speed to be adopted.

These pieces of information are stored in the storage unit 22 in the mobile station 20 before the operation of the vehicle starts.
For example, from the base station 10 to the mobile station 20, the radio unit 18
These pieces of information may be transmitted via a wireless connection between the wireless units 27 and stored in the storage unit 22 under the control of the own station operation status detection unit 21. When this method is adopted, for example, the information can be corrected or updated by downloading from the base station 10 while the vehicle is operating. Alternatively, the information may be stored in the storage unit 22 under the control of the mobile unit management processing unit 11 (and the local station operation status detection unit 21) by connecting the interface 15 and the interface 23. Also, the base station 10
Rather than directly connecting the mobile station 20 with the mobile station 20 from a wireless or wired connection, a dedicated device for supplying information on the checkpoint or the like to the mobile station 20 or from another mobile station,
The program may be downloaded to the storage unit 22 via a wireless connection or a connection via the interface 23.

FIGS. 3 and 4 show the flow of operation of the mobile station 20 and the base station 10 in the present embodiment. Mobile station 20
The local station operation status detection unit 21 downloads information for operation status determination and stores the information in the storage unit 22,
The procedure shown in FIG. 3 is repeatedly executed at a predetermined frequency. In the procedure shown in FIG. 3, first, information such as the current position, the current time, and the moving speed obtained by the GPS receiver 25 is input to the own-station operation status detecting unit 21 (100). When the current position of the input information matches one of the check point positions Pi (i = 0 to 5) stored in the storage unit 22 (102), the own station operation status detection unit 21 The scheduled time ti related to the check point is compared with the current time obtained from the GPS receiver 25 (104). As a result of executing step 104, the own station operation status detecting unit 21 executes step 106 if the current time <scheduled time ti + a predetermined allowable error, and returns to step 10 if not.
8 are executed respectively. In step 106, the own station operation status detection unit 21 compares the moving speed obtained from the GPS receiver 25 with the speed stored in the storage unit 22 or its range. If the measured moving speed has a difference of a predetermined degree or more from the speed on the storage unit 22 or if the measured moving speed does not belong to the speed range on the storage unit 22, the own station operation status detection The unit 21 executes Step 108, and otherwise ends the procedure shown in FIG.
In step 108, the own station operation status detection unit 21
Information such as the current position, current time, and moving speed obtained by the S receiver 25 is transmitted to the base station 10 via the wireless unit 27. Information other than the information obtained by the GPS receiver 25 may be additionally transmitted.

The mobile unit management processing unit 11 in the base station 10
The procedure shown in FIG. 4 is performed. In this procedure, when the mobile unit management processing unit 11 receives information such as the current position, the current time, and the moving speed from any one of the mobile stations 20, that is, information indicating an operation abnormality, the mobile unit management processing unit 11 stores the information in the storage unit 12. , A process of displaying the position of the vehicle related to the operation abnormality and the like on the screen of the display unit 14 in a superimposed manner, a process of outputting a message indicating the operation abnormality from the audio output unit 14a, and the like are executed ( 202). If the content of the notified operation abnormality is a content indicating that the arrival of the package to the customer is significantly delayed or the possibility of the delay (204), the mobile management processing unit 11 generates a delay for the corresponding customer. The user is notified of what to do and the degree of delay (expected) (206). The line connection by the interface 16 can be used for this notification. In some cases, the wireless unit 18 can be used. The notification destination may be the delivery destination of the package or the sender.

Therefore, in this embodiment, an operation abnormality can be detected when the time condition is not satisfied as shown in FIG. 2B, or when traffic is congested as shown in FIG. And when the speed of the vehicle is decreasing. As described above, since the management based on the time and the management based on the speed are performed, according to the present embodiment, it is not necessary to perform the time / time conversion processing in the mobile station 20 and, furthermore, after the mobile station 20 is involved in the traffic jam. This can be detected as an operation abnormality at an early point. Furthermore, since it is not necessary to save the output of the GPS receiver 25 as data, it is not necessary to use an external storage device or the like as the storage unit 22, and the device can be downsized.

It should be noted that whether a situation indicated as C in FIG. 2B, that is, a passage or arrival earlier than the scheduled time, is detected as an operation abnormality is determined according to the nature and purpose of the system. Should. Further, the positioning result by the GPS receiver 25 usually includes an error due to intentional accuracy deterioration processing by the GPS operation authority, the influence of the ionosphere surrounding the earth, and the like. DGPS (Differential GPS), which has been developed as a method to suppress positioning errors
May be executed using a wireless connection between the mobile station 20 and the base station 10. In other words, the wireless transmission path to be used for reporting the operation abnormality of the moving object may be used for transmitting error information for implementing DGPS. Further, when the base station 10 receives the information on the operation abnormality, the base station 10 stores the information.
Actions other than display, voice output, and customer notification may be taken.
For example, in response to the occurrence of an operation abnormality, the information is transmitted to the mobile station 20 related to the vehicle to correct the position Pi of the checkpoint related to the vehicle, the scheduled time ti, the speed vi, and the like, and is stored in the storage unit 22. May be updated. Alternatively, for example, when the customer is an assembly factory and the goods being carried are parts used in the factory, a measure is taken to connect to the customer's process management system in response to the report of the operation abnormality and automatically correct the parts input plan. Can also be taken.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a mobile operation management system according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram for explaining the principle of the embodiment;
In particular, (a) is a conceptual diagram showing a relationship between a route and a checkpoint, (b) is a timing chart showing comparison judgment by time, and (c) is a conceptual diagram showing a traffic jam situation.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a flow of an operation of a mobile station.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a flow of an operation of the base station.

[Explanation of symbols]

Reference Signs List 10 base station, 11 mobile unit management processing unit, 18 radio unit, 20 mobile station, 21 own station operation status detection unit, 22 storage unit, 25 GPS receiver, 27 radio unit, P0 to P5
Checkpoint, t0-t5 Scheduled time, v1-v
4 Speed.

Continued on the front page F term (reference) 5H180 AA01 BB04 BB05 CC12 DD04 EE02 FF04 FF12 FF13 FF22 FF25 FF32 5J062 AA01 AA12 BB01 CC07 GG01 GG02 HH01 HH05 5K067 AA21 BB26 DD20 DD51 EE02 EE31 H05

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. A mobile station used in a mobile operation management system having a fixedly disposed base station and a mobile station mounted on the mobile object, the mobile station being set on a scheduled movement route of the own station. Means for storing the position of the checkpoint being performed and the speed or range of the mobile unit to take at the checkpoint; means for detecting the position and speed of the own station during operation of the mobile unit; Means for determining whether or not the speed at which the own station has arrived at or passed the checkpoint matches the speed to be taken or its range, based on the contents of the storage and the result of the detection during operation; Means for wirelessly reporting to the base station when it is determined that they do not match, the mobile station comprising: 2. The mobile station according to claim 1, wherein when the base station wirelessly notifies the base station that it is determined that the mobile station does not match, the speed at which the mobile station arrives / departs or passes the check point is determined by the base station. A mobile station that reports to a station by radio. 3. A mobile operation management system having a fixedly disposed base station and a mobile station mounted on the mobile, wherein the mobile station is the mobile station according to claim 1 or 2, A mobile operation management system, characterized in that the base station comprises: means for receiving a radio report from the mobile station; and means for notifying the surroundings when the report is received. 4. A mobile operation management system having a fixedly disposed base station and a mobile station mounted on a mobile object, wherein the mobile station is the mobile station according to claim 2; However, if the mobile station associated with the reporting mobile station is expected to arrive at its destination with a delay of at least a predetermined amount, or if the mobile Means for notifying the user of the starting point or destination of the moving object or the service related to the moving object when it can be considered that
A mobile operation management system, comprising: