Research and Implementation of Blind Sidewalk Detection in Portable ETA System

Electronic Travel Aid (ETA) technology can be used to help blind people walk. Blind users can judge current environment with the prompt of ETA system. The portable ETA system is a model of ETA system which is simple in structure, easy to carry, easy to use and low cost. One of the important research is how to extract the orientation of the blind sidewalk accurately. This paper using the methods of image segmentation, image edge detection and blind sidewalk edge searching to divide the blind sidewalk from the pavement and get the information of the blind sidewalk orientation. Then turned the blind sidewalk orientation information into sound and feedback to the user. In this way, users will be able to learn only through short-term training.