Segment aggregation and interleaving of data types in a geographic database and methods for use thereof in a navigation application

A method of performing route calculation using a navigation system and real time traffic update data, wherein the navigation system uses a geographic database that includes

• data entities that represent aggregations of multiple consecutive segments of roads and
• data entities that represent individual segments of roads, some of which are part of the aggregations,
• wherein each data entity that represents an individual segment of road that is part of one of said aggregations includes an upward reference to the data entity that represents said one of said aggregations, the method comprising:
• obtaining the real-time traffic update data via wireless communication;
• using said real-time traffic update data to associate weighting factors with the data entities that represent individual segments of roads that are affected by traffic;
• with respect to each of said data entities that represent individual segments of roads to which said weighting factors are associated, using the upward reference included therewith to relate the weighting factor associated therewith to the data entity that represents the aggregation that includes said individual segment of road;
• and
• calculating a solution route taking into account said weighting factors.

A method of using a navigation system with real time traffic update data for route calculation, wherein the navigation system uses a geographic database that contains data entities that represent segments of roads, wherein the geographic database includes a plurality of separate layers that include separate collections of the data entities based upon functional ranks of the represented segments of roads;

• and further wherein the geographic database contains
• data entities that represent aggregations of multiple consecutive segments of roads and abbreviated data entities that represent the individual segments of roads which are part of the aggregations, wherein each data entity that represents an aggregation refers to the abbreviated data entities that represent the road segments that form the aggregation, and further wherein the abbreviated data entities referred to by a data entity that represents an aggregation are located in the same layer as the data entity that represents the aggregation, and
• non-abbreviated data entities that represent individual segments of roads, some of which are part of the aggregations, wherein the non-abbreviated data entities that represent individual segments of roads are located in a separate layer from the data entities that represent the aggregations of multiple segments of roads that represent the same segments of roads, wherein the abbreviated data entities contain references to the non-abbreviated data entities that represent the same segments of roads,
• wherein the method comprises the steps of:
• obtaining the real-time traffic update data via wireless communication;
• using said real-time traffic update data to associate weighting factors with the non-abbreviated data entities that represent the segments of roads that are affected by traffic;
• calculating a solution route using said plurality of layers;
• and
• when using a layer that contains data entities that represent aggregations of multiple consecutive segments of roads, using the references contained in the abbreviated data entities to take said weighting factors into account.