Buses as Mobile Sensing Platforms?

Roland Piquepaille writes "According to European researchers, modern buses could be used as mobile sensing platforms, sending out live information to be used to control traffic and detect road hazards. The 3.83 million euro EU-funded MORYNE project was completed in March 2008 with a test in Berlin, Germany. During this test, the researchers 'equipped city buses with environmental sensors and cameras, allowing the vehicles to become transmitters of measurements, warnings and live or recorded videos to anyone allowed to access the data.' "

Comments

Traffic cameras?

[religious freak]

So what's the difference between this and the traffic/CCTV cameras which are already becoming ubiquitous? If a society wants to go this route, this seems like more hassle, if you ask me.

Re:Traffic cameras?

[jsnipy]

The difference is that the buses are mobile. Whereas the traffic/CCTV cameras are stationary.

Re:Traffic cameras?

[pha7boy]

buses are mobile, thus less likely to be vandalized, easier to maintain, probably less intrusive. And, it would probably cost less to install cameras on buses then to install CCTV at every corner.

Re:Traffic cameras?

[zappepcs]

Not only that, but as a bonus, you only have to send the repair tech to the bus depot, not the street corner with a bucket lift.

There are many possible and very good uses for mobile sensor platforms ... think "Can you hear me now?" and you're pretty close.

Not only can they be used for traffic data, but also wireless network quality measurement. In addition to this, there are uses for short range wireless networks that could use buses as roving AP's for collection of data from those networks. Think of a WiFi network that mostly only needs connectivity now and then. As the bus drives by, boom, connection and data transfer.

There are stand alone applications that don't normally need connection except to report telemetry data.. buses come in handy. Think of all those cameras, if their network fails, they have no way to report telemetric data... unless a WiFi mobile AP comes in range.. woot! As a back channel for all sorts of things, this works well in the coverage area of the bus lines, and is suitable for many applications without huge infrastructure or maintenance costs.

Great... I've got an application.

[palegray.net]

How about sensing when buses aren't meeting their route schedule requirements and using this data to improve the public transit system? A somewhat "direct" application to be sure, but one that's sorely in needed in places like metro Atlanta that depend on MARTA for mass transit. I can't even begin to estimate how many times buses have either been substantially late, not shown up at all, or passed right by a stop with waiting passengers. It actually prompted me to buy a car years ago.

Typical

[Linker3000]

You wait half an hour for a sensor then three come along at the same time!

Re:Sad, but true

[TheDugong]

No, the US (and Australia for that matter) has the most ridiculous system where pedestrians and vehicles can both have green lights when crossing each other's paths.

Works great in New Zealand

[EmbeddedJanitor]

One of the biggest hurdles to bus usage is that the customers don't know when the next bus is coming. Here in NZ we have a bus monitoring system that addresses this. At each bus stop, there's a low cost and reasonably vandal proof display with a wireless link. It tells you when the next bus is expected to arrive. This uses real-time bus tracking information which is pretty accurate. Each bus has a GPS and sends data to a central machine which does the tracking and sends out info updates to the terminals every minute or so.

The result has been a huge improvement in bus user satisfaction (and the number of passengers).

The system as a whole tracks bus speeds, congestion etc and the longer term data is used to plan extra buses etc.

Collating the sensor data

[zmollusc]

"Ooooh!, This is interesting, Bob. Every bus except 003729 shows real bad air quality and big queues of traffic. Pull it in and check out the sensor pack" .... ...

"Hi Jeff! I am at the depot, and it seems that bus 003729 had its sensor pack attached to the FRONT bumper of the bus by mistake!"