JPH05325094A - Road traffic guide system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To use an already prepared traffic signal to transmit the traffic guide to the driver of a vehicle. CONSTITUTION:A light projection controller 15 is provided in the front of a light source 13 of a lamp 11 of a traffic signal 10. The operation of this controller 15 is controlled based on traffic guide information like position information or road information to flicker the lamp 11 at a high speed. A vehicle A is provided with a photodetector 31 which detects high-speed flickering of the light of the lamp 11, a decoder 34 which decodes traffic guide information with the detection signal, and a voice output device 41, a printer 42, and a picture display device 43 which display the position or the like based on decoded traffic guide information.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a road traffic guidance system, and more particularly to a system for transmitting traffic guidance such as vehicle position and road information to a driver.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, a road-vehicle information system (RACS: Rord & Aut
omobile Communication System) and advanced automotive traffic information system (AMTICS: Advanst Mobile Traffic Informa
tion & Communication System) is known. These use position information and other information data from a road beacon to communicate with a vehicle using radio waves to transmit information. Further, a system for detecting position information from GPS satellites is also applied.

[0003]

However, in any of the above methods, radio waves or quasi-microwaves are used for communication with the vehicle, and there are the following problems. That is, there is a limit to the frequency band of radio waves currently used, and allocation is determined over almost the entire frequency band below 1 GHz. Therefore, it will be practically difficult to cope with the future increase in the number of car telephones and broadcasting and communication lines for cars. Further, there is a drawback that a use qualification and a license are required in order to use radio waves. Furthermore, since the allocation of radio waves varies from country to country, it is difficult to adopt a common system. In addition, in the case of radio wave communication, mixing of noise becomes a problem, and there is a problem in reliability of communication information.

The present invention pays attention to the above-mentioned conventional problems, and when transmitting position information, road conditions and other traffic guidance to a driver, the existing traffic signal is effectively used and a lot of information can be transmitted in a short time. It is an object of the present invention to provide a road traffic guidance system that enables accurate transmission in a vehicle.

[0005]

A light 1 for a traffic signal 10
1 is provided with a light emission controller 15 for reducing the light at a high speed, and the light emission controller 15 is controlled by the road position information or the like to be transmitted to reduce the light of the lamp 11 and to the vehicle A side. Is equipped with a photodetector for detecting the blinking of the light of the lamp 11 and a decoder 34 for decoding the information by the detection signal, and is equipped with a vehicle position display device for inputting the information decoded by the decoder 34. It was done.

[0006]

[Operation] The light emitted from the light 11 of the traffic signal 10 can be reduced by the light emission controller 15 at a speed that is not felt by the human eye, and the position information to be transmitted to the vehicle is transmitted. The light of the lamp 12 of the traffic signal 10 can be turned off by controlling the light projection controller 15 based on the road information and the like. On the other hand, a photodetector is mounted on the side of the vehicle A, which can detect the blinking of the light of the lamp 11 of the traffic signal 10, and the decoder 34 decodes the information output by the detection signal. Can be output to the vehicle position display device.

[0007]

[Example] As shown in FIG. 1, a traffic signal 10 is provided with blue, yellow, and red lamps 11. The lamp 11 has a housing 12 as shown in FIG. Thirteen
And a transparent plate 14 provided in the front opening 12a of the housing 12, and the transparent plate 1 of the housing 12 is provided.
A light projection controller 15 is provided on the front surface of No. 4. The light projection controller 15 can electrically control the transmission of light, for example, as shown in FIG.
As shown in (a) and (b), a liquid crystal shutter that is connected to a power source 17 via a switch 16 and blocks the light of the light source 13 when the switch 16 is turned off and transmits the light of the light source 13 when the switch 17 is turned on, For example, an electronic shutter. It should be noted that, as shown in FIG.
It may be provided inside.

The floodlight controller 15 has its traffic signal 10
A fixed-type pulse signal (fixed information such as location, route name, municipality name, road guide, etc.) and variable information that changes from time to time such as traffic jams, construction, accidents, traffic regulations and weather information ( Based on (hereinafter, referred to as PCM information), the terminal controller 20 provided for each traffic signal 10 controls at high speed, that is, the switch 16 is turned on and off at high speed to reduce the light of the lamp 11 at high speed. To do. This reduction is the light 11
Each color (blue, yellow, red) shall be performed at the time of lighting. The lighting of the lamp 11 is performed at a high speed that does not react to human eyes, and each color of the lamp 11 is apparently visible in a lit state.

The fixed information and variable information input to the terminal controller 20 will be described. A control signal is input to each of the terminal controllers 20 by the main control device 21, and when the traffic signal 10 is a regional control system, the main control device 21 is connected to the computer 22 of the traffic control center.
The fixed information and variable information are converted into PCM by the traffic information output device 23 and the traffic flow controller 24 of the computer 22 and sent to the main control device 21 for control. Further, when the traffic signal 10 is of the system control system, the main controller 21 is controlled by inputting PCM fixed information with the IC card 25 or the like. Here, the system control method is performed to smooth the flow of traffic on a specific route or a specific area, and is often used in urban areas, and the regional control method is included therein. By inputting the PCM information to the main control device 21 as described above, the PCM information is output to the terminal controller 20 of each traffic signal 10 on the specific route or the specific area to output the PCM information of each traffic signal 10. The light projection controller 15 provided in the lamp 11 is operated and controlled. Further, when the traffic signal 10 is a point (single) control system, there is only the terminal controller 20, so the fixed information PCMized by the IC card 25 or the like is input to the terminal controller 20.

Next, the equipment on the vehicle side will be described. The vehicle A includes a blue, yellow, and red optical filter 30 that detects only the light of the lamps 11 of the respective colors, and a lamp decrement detector 32 that detects the deceleration of the lamps 11 of the respective colors by the photodetector 31. , A drive / signal processing device 33 for inputting a detection signal from the photodetector 31 is provided, and the photodetector 33 is started up and the detected subtraction signal is shaped and the level is adjusted in time series. It is processed as data. The processed signal is sent to the decoder 34 to read and detect the PCM fixed information and variable information output from the terminal controller 20.

Further, the vehicle A is equipped with a navigation system for detecting its own vehicle position without the assistance of position information from the outside. This is a distance sensor 35 and a direction sensor 3.
6 and outputs these detection signals to the comparison / retrieval unit 38 composed of a computer via the code converter 37. In the comparison / search device 38, a database 39 such as map data formed by CD-ROM, tourist information, nearest station, parking lot, hotel, inn, river, etc.
The desired data is read from and the position of the own vehicle is displayed. Further, there is provided an input device 40 for manually inputting the desired information such as a destination, a desired arrival time to the destination, a tourist spot, and a parking lot into the code converter 37.

Here, the output signal of the decoder 34 is input to the comparison / search device 38, and at least the detected fixed information is expanded on the map data read from the memory to display the position of the traffic signal 10. At the same time, the navigation system corrects the detected position data. The correction process may be performed by subtracting the deviation of the coordinates on the map data from the orthogonal axis. A voice output device 41, a printer 42, and an image display device 43 such as a CRT are connected to the comparison / search device 38 as output means.
The necessary information is output to notify the driver. Of course, also for variable information, the information decrypted by the decryptor 34 is directly or in the database 39.
It outputs with the information of.

The operation of the road traffic guidance system constructed as described above is as follows. The driver travels while detecting the self-position by performing dead reckoning with the installed navigation system, but when the vehicle A approaches the traffic signal 10, the light of the lamp 11 that is lit up is fixed information or variable information. This is detected by the in-vehicle photodetector 31 because the point is decreased based on At this time, the light of the lamp 12 of the traffic signal 10 is reduced at a high speed so as not to react to human eyes, so that each color of the apparent lamp 12 can be seen as being lit. In the vehicle A, the detected light reduction is decoded by the decoder 34, and this is output to the comparison / search device 38 and input as accurate position information. Therefore, the self position is corrected and the database 3
9 is displayed, the position is displayed on the image display device 43 together with the map, a hard copy is obtained as necessary, and traffic information, road guidance, etc. are transmitted by voice.

According to the above embodiment, various traffic guidance information is output as the light reduction of the lamp 12 of the traffic signal 10,
The vehicle can detect accurate information each time it approaches the traffic signal 10, and highly accurate position information can be obtained, and the existing traffic signal 10 is used, so that the cost reduction effect is very high. In addition, since light is used for transmitting information, there is no problem of dielectric noise, and accurate information can be transmitted especially on roads in contact with railways. Further, since it is optical transmission, it can respond to an increase in the amount of information transmission, can sufficiently meet diversifying user needs, and the color of the lamp 12 of the traffic signal 10 is internationally common. Therefore, there is an advantage that it is possible to standardize the method between the international countries.

[0015]

When transmitting position information, road information and other traffic information to the driver, not only the existing traffic signal 10 can be effectively used but also a large amount of information can be accurately transmitted in a short time. It is only necessary to provide the light projection controller 15 on the light 11 of the traffic signal 10, and the light projection controller 15 is simply provided without significantly improving the existing traffic signal 10. Therefore, the structure can be inexpensive and the light 12 Since the lamp itself does not decrease at high speed, the durability of the lamp 12 is not deteriorated.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of a road traffic guidance system according to an embodiment.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view of a lamp.

FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining the operation of the light projecting controller.

FIG. 4 is a cross-sectional view showing another example of a lamp.

[Explanation of symbols]

10 ... Traffic signal, 11 ... Lamp, 13 ... Light source, 15 ... Projection controller, 20 ... Terminal controller, 21 ... Main controller, 23 ...
Traffic information output device, 24 ... Traffic flow controller, 25 ... IC card, 31 ... Photodetector, 33 ... Driving / signal processing device, 3
4 ... Decoder, 35 ... Distance sensor, 36 ... Direction sensor, 3
7 ... Code converter, 38 ... Comparison / search device, A ... Vehicle.

─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of front page (51) Int.Cl. ⁵ Identification code Office reference number FI Technical display location G08G 1/095 E 9323-3H 1/0969 9323-3H

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A floodlight controller 15 for electrically controlling transmission of light is provided in a lamp 11 of a traffic signal 10, and the floodlight controller 15 is controlled based on road position information to be transmitted. The vehicle A side is provided with a photodetector for detecting the light reduction of the light 11 and a decoder 34 for decoding the information by the detected light reduction. ,
Further, a road traffic guidance system, which is equipped with a vehicle position display device for inputting decoding information by the decoding device 34.