DFI

Today, the information about actual departure times of buses and trains is a basic quality criterion for passengers of local public transport. Especially in areas of low population density, the cost-efficiency and the flexibility are decisive factors for the operation of dynamic passenger information systems. In order to meet these challenges we offer a flexible multi-module system ready to fulfil the individual needs of the transportation company.

The base module is equipped with a microcontroller and a GPRS radio data module. According to the individual use case this basic module can be extended by further components. An add-on of the user interface module with buttons and a display connects the passenger information device. To reach also visually impaired people the information device can be supplemented with speech output. Furthermore it is possible to control larger displays, which are used for example at stations.

In order to calculate the departure times dynamically it is necessary to locate the involved vehicles. For this purpose the basic module of the system can be extended by a GPS receiver. This so called On-Board-Unit (OBU) can also capture extra information from the internal vehicle data bus (e. g. IBIS¹ ) such as the ID of the vehicle and the current route. The captured data is transmitted to a device server via GPRS in a customisable interval. The information about the vehicle’s current position can be used to predict the time of arrival at the next stop. If any deviations to the static timetable occur, the predicted arrival time will be transmitted to the passenger information devices at the corresponding stops.

The passenger information device can be supplied with solar panels. Due to this and the use of the GSM network for radio data communication, there is no need for a special infrastructure. This allows the cost-effective and low-maintenance operation of the passenger information device.

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¹Integrated Board Information System