Smartphone-based information and navigation aids for public transport travellers

Abstract

Digital navigation assistance on Smartphones has recently gained high attention due to capable mobile devices, off-board based navigation software and advancements in wireless network technologies. Mobile information and navigation aids can assist travellers in non-trivial navigation and orientation tasks in unknown geographical regions or transport systems. Whereas car navigation has reached a certain level of maturity, assistance for multimodal travellers especially in public transport networks is still in its infancies. Integration of mobile multimodal journey planning and navigation and guidance in complex public interchange facilities is not adequately addressed by existing systems. Thus, in this paper we propose a personal travel companion on Smartphones for assisting multimodal travellers. We focus on the topics mobile journey planning, pedestrian route calculation, navigation and guidance in public interchange buildings and seamless transition between indoor and outdoor positioning. Moreover the paper describes the prototypical implementation on Off-the-shelf Smartphones and evaluation results.