Comparative performance of various automotive navigation technologies

The first practical in-vehicle automotive navigation systems (introduced in 1985) utilized dead reckoning combined with digital map-matching to keep track of vehicle positions and to show them in real time on digital map displays. This dead-reckoning/map-matching technology has advanced considerably. In recent years, other vehicle location and tracking technologies have emerged including Global Positioning Satellites (GPS), differential GPS, radio-location (resembling Loran or inverse Loran), cellular phone tracking, and electronic benchmarks (or signposts) in or near the roads. Loran C is also under consideration. The advantages and limitations of the various vehicle location and tracking techniques are described, and how their limitations can be overcome by combining or improving techniques is discussed. Tradeoffs between features, performance, and cost are presented for some specific applications.