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US 10,611,389 B2Granted
Autonomous rail or off rail vehicle movement and system among a group of vehicles
OwnerVinod Khoslainventor
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
The present invention provides an autonomous vehicle (“AV”) configured on a railway system. The AV can be configured among the other vehicles and railway to communicate with a rider on a peer to peer basis to pick up the rider on demand, rather than the rider being held hostage to a fixed railway schedule. The rider can have an application on his/her cell phone, which tracks each of the AVs, and contact them using the application on the cell phone.
Claims57
A method for moving an autonomous vehicle among a plurality of vehicles configured on a railway track system, the method comprising:
- initiating movement of the autonomous vehicle configured in a rail of the railway system, the autonomous vehicle comprising a sensor array system configured spatially on the autonomous vehicle (AV), the sensor array system comprising a plurality of active sensor systems;
- at least one processor device coupled to the sensor array system;
- a memory device coupled to the processing device;
- an instruction stored on the memory device, the instruction when executed by the processor causes the sensor array system to, as the AV travels a current route on the rail of the railway track system, dynamically detect a reflectance of an event from a plurality of events, the event being selected from an anomaly, a stationary feature, or a location of one of a plurality of vehicles configured on the rail of the railway system;
- and
- using data from the reflectance of the event or the plurality of events to adjust a movement of the AV in relationship to the event, while the AV is mechanically disconnected from the plurality of vehicles configured on the rail of the railway system;
- and
- monitoring each of the AVs using a central database in real time, while collecting information associated each AVs in the central database;
- moving the AV from the rail of the railway system to an adjacent system configured with the rail, the adjacent system comprising at least one of a roadway, a waterway, or any combination thereof, such that the processor device coupled to the sensor array system executes an instruction stored on the memory device causing the sensor array system to, as the AV travels a current route on the adjacent system, dynamically detect a reflectance of an event from a plurality of events, the event being selected from an anomaly, a stationary feature, or a location of one of the plurality of vehicles;
- and
- using data from the reflectance of the event or the plurality of events to adjust a movement of the AV in relationship to the event, while the AV is mechanically disconnected from the rail of the railway system;
- and
- using a cell phone to communicate with the AV to contact the AV for a pickup by a user before the initiating movement of the AV configured on the rail of the railway system.
10 more elements
A method for initiating a call from a user using a network and moving an autonomous vehicle among a plurality of vehicles configured on a railway track system, the method comprising:
- initiating movement of the autonomous vehicle configured in a rail of the railway system, the autonomous vehicle comprising a sensor array system configured spatially on the autonomous vehicle (AV), the sensor array system comprising a plurality of active sensor systems;
- at least one processor device coupled to the sensor array system;
- a memory device coupled to the processing device;
- an instruction stored on the memory device, the instruction when executed by the processor causes the sensor array system to, as the AV travels a current route on the rail of the railway track system, dynamically detect a reflectance of an event from a plurality of events, the event being selected from an anomaly, a stationary feature, or a location of a plurality of other vehicles;
- and
- using data from the reflectance of the event or the plurality of events to adjust a movement of the AV in relationship to the event, while the AV is mechanically disconnected from the plurality of other vehicles configured on the rail of the railway system or the AV is mechanically connected to one or N−1 of the plurality of vehicles numbered from 2 to N.
3 more elements
A system for initiating movement and adjusting the movement of an autonomous vehicle configured on a rail of a railway track system, the system comprising:
- a plurality of vehicles configured on the rail of the railway system and the autonomous vehicle (“AV”) configured on a rail of the railway system, and mechanically detached from the plurality of vehicles, the AV comprising:
- a sensor array system configured spatially on the autonomous vehicle (AV), the sensor array system comprising a plurality of active sensor systems;
- at least one processor device coupled to the sensor array system;
- a memory device coupled to the processing device;
- a first instruction stored on the memory device, the first instruction when executed by the processor causes the sensor array system to, as the AV travels a current route on a rail of the railway track system, dynamically detect a reflectance of an event from a plurality of events, the event being selected from an anomaly, a stationary feature, or a location of one of a plurality of vehicles;
- a second instruction stored on the memory device, the second instruction when executed by the processor causes the sensor array system to, as the AV travels a current route on an adjacent system, the adjacent system comprising at least one of a roadway, a waterway, or a combination of the roadway and the waterway, dynamically detect a reflectance of an event from a plurality of events, the event being selected from an anomaly, a stationary feature, or a location of one of the plurality of vehicles;
- a relationship table comprising a plurality of sensor configurations for each respective one of a plurality of active sensor systems included in the sensor array system to adjust within a time frame at least one output sensor configuration for the sensor array to identify the event using the detected reflectance of the event;
- and
- an output to influence movement of the AV based upon the detected reflectance and identified event as the AV travels the current route;
- and
- an application configured on a cell phone coupled to a networking system, the application on the cell phone of the user provided to initiate pickup of the user using the AV.
8 more elements
A method for moving an autonomous vehicle (AV) among a plurality of vehicles configured on a railway system, the method comprising:
- dynamically detecting a reflectance of an event from a plurality of events of the AV on a rail of the railway system using a sensor array system configured spatially on the AV that has a plurality of active sensor systems, the event being selected from an anomaly, a stationary feature, or a location of one or more of the plurality of vehicles;
- using data from the reflectance of the event or the plurality of events to adjust a movement of the AV in relationship to the event, while the AV is mechanically disconnected from the other vehicles in the plurality of vehicles;
- monitoring the AV and the other vehicles in the plurality of vehicles for information in real time;
- and;
- collecting the information in a central database.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.