INTEGRATED PEDSTRIAN GUIDANCE SYSTEM USING
Hirohiko Ohkubo
Mitsubihi Precision Company
345 Kamimachiya
Day Phone: 81-467-42-5712
Fax: 81-467-42-5799
Email: ohkubohr@mpcnet.co.jp
Presenter #2
Seiji Kitakaze
NEC Corpolation
5-229-23 Shiba
Minato-ku 108-8420
Email:
s-kitakaze@aj.jp.nec.com
This paper presents the contents and
evaluation results held at 2005 Aichi-Expo of development project undertaken by
Japanese government, METI that provide integrated assistive system.
1. INTRODUCTION
Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) of
1.1 Backgrounds and Concept
Information Technology (IT) is becoming popular and so-called IT society is
growing. All people can join the IT society, not only ordinary people but also
disabled persons.
Many kinds of assistive systems for persons with disabilities have been
developed and used so far, but there is neither compatibility nor
interoperability so that the different types of devices that are specifically
provided for each system has to be used by users.
The purpose of this project is to develop a single device which can
commonly be used for different types of way-finding/guidance systems resulting
much benefit and usability become available to users especially for disabled
persons.
The common platform architecture is applied to integrate functions to be
worked with different types of sensors and media such as GPS, Infrared
Communications, Radio Communications and RFID, and also provide the expansion
capability for new sensors would be developed in future.
The development of the system not only for visually impaired but also other
disabilities like hearing disabled, locomotive impaired, wheel chair users,
etc. is very important for all disabilities, and the system would be also
convenient to ordinary people.
1.2 Scope
The project is being scheduled over four years to complete from fiscal 2003
to 2006 as described in the following. FY, Fiscal year means April to March.
FY2003: Review of functions to be serviced and system concept
Review and evaluation of compatibility and interoperability between each
systems development and evaluation of prototype 1 operated with PDA
FY2004: Improvement and refine the functions and performance of Prototype 1
Development of Prototype 2 operated with cell phone
FY2005: Field test of Aichi World Exposition
Refine Prototype 2 with results of field test
FY2006: Finalize the functions and specifications of Prototype 2 as a
Standard user terminal. Review of standard specification, open to public and
proposed to JIS (Japan Industrial Standard) and International Standard
Figure-1 shows the roadmap of project development.
As shown above this project will finally provide a small size, light weight
mobile terminal integrated into the cell phone with major functions using GPS, infrared,
radio, and RFID sensors/media which need to assist pedestrians with disables
and also normal persons.
2. CONFIGURATION
2.1 Prototype 1
This will use the conventional system already installed and also the modern
technology. Especially for visually impaired people, Rf system and Ir system are
popular in
For position information: GPS, Ir, RFID
For directional information: Rf and Ir
2.2 Prototype 2
As for prototype 2, we planned to use mobile phone with GPS service. And we
also planned to develop small adapter unit that can be attached to mobile
phone. In this step, we incorporated the Bluetooth technology. Figure-2.1 shows
the prototype 2 configuration, Table-2.1 shows the
specification and Figure-2.2 shows example of typical screen on the cell phone.
Item Specification Remarks
Sensor Ir receiver Wave length: 870 nm
FM transmitter Frequency: 75.8 MHz
FM receiver Frequency: 312.45 MHz
Interface Cell phone interface RS232c 1ch 300bps/384bps
IrDA 1ch 96bps/15200bps
Bluetooth Bluetooth 1.2, serial profile
Human Machine Interface Operating switch Power sw,
Control sw x 2, Volume sw
LED LED x 3
Speaker 1 ea
Microphone 1 ea
Headset connector 1 ea
Dimension W55mm x D140mm x H35mm
Weight 250g
Operating time Continuous: 1 hour Intermittent: 6 hours
3. EVALUATION?@TEST
Utilizing prototype 2 system, we conducted the evaluation test as follows:
3.1 Test conditions
Date: 20 June to 26 August 2005
Place: The field of 2005 Aichi Expo, Nagoya, Japan
Participants:
Visually impaired 171
Blind 132; Age 20’s to 70’s
Low vision 39; Age 20’s to 70’s
Wheel chair users 30
Hearing impaired and other disabilities 40
3.2 Test route and evaluation items
We conducted evaluation in several route and items.
Typical route is shown in figure- 3.1.
3.3 Questionnaire
We made some question sheets in Q and A
style.
The questionnaire includes followings and others.
Participant’s status, Outgoing frequency, Accidents while
walking.
On Information provided: Route guidance information, Caution information,
Caution information.
Message contents, Message timing.
Human interface.
System effectiveness.
General comments.
3.4 Test situation
Figure-3.2 shows the test situation.
3.4 Test Results
3.4.1 Results of questionnaire
It took one day to conduct the test for one person.
There are many questions to each participant.
The data of questionnaire are now processing. The results will be
introduced on CSUN2006 conference on site.
3. 4.2 Comments of participants
There were many comments at test. Typical comments are as follows:
- It is very assistive to have voice message guidance especially at
unfamiliar place.
- It is very comfortable and dreamy because my activity area becomes wider.
- Infrared system is very good because I can judge the direction to the
destination when accustomed.
- The terminal is lighter than prototype1. It is better to get lighter
weight terminal than now.
- On message contents, approximately has too wide meaning for each person.
- When getting familiar with the system, more faster
message speed is required.
- When using the voice message guidance, it becomes anxiety if the message
is lost.
4. CONCLUSION
Most of participants evaluated that the system works well and have great
expectation for development of new devices as the next step.
For future system, providing the convenience to disabilities will be
essential as well as providing the solution to all peoples. For this purpose,
the global standardization of the system is very important.
5. ACKOWLEDGEMNT
It is appreciated for kind cooperation and assistance that a lot of
precious opinions and suggestions are given by Mr. HIRANO of 2005 Expo
Association, Ms. SUGI of NTT DoCoMo company, Mr. TESHIGAHARA of Nomura Research Institute, Mr.MATSUMURA of Ikeno Tuken company, Mr.TSUKADA of
Hitachi company and participants to those tests.
6. REFERENCES
(1) CSUN 2002 Conference proceedings: Evaluation of Pedestrian Information
and Communication Systems-A for visually impaired persons
(2) CSUN 2005 Conference proceedings: Integrated Wayfinding/Guidance
System Using GPS/IR/RF/RFID with Mobile Device
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