Travel-time data provision system using vehicle license number recognition devices

This paper proposes a travel-time data provision system for which demand is very high among Japanese drivers. This system measures the actual travel time of a driver using vehicle license number recognition devices, predicts a travel time to his or her destination, and furnishes him or her with the predicted travel time. For this travel time measurement, the authors developed an image-processing type vehicle license number recognition device called an automatic vehicle identification (AVI) terminal which consists mainly of a CCD camera with an electronic shutter and image processors. AVI terminals are installed at two or more locations on the same route to automatically recognize the number plate of each vehicle passing through these installation points. The travel time to point `X´ when a vehicle runs from the current point is predicted by verifying such recognized number plate and finding a travel time from a difference in the passage times of two vehicles having the same number plate data. As a concrete example of such travel-time data provision system, this paper discusses a system which simultaneously offers travel time information on each route at a diverging point for two or more different routes each heading to the center of a city and indicates how effective the system is to drivers for their route selection