Counting Empty Parking Spots at Truck Stops
Principal Investigator:
Nikos Papanikolopoulos, Professor, Computer Science and Engineering
Co-Investigator:
- Vassilios Morellas, Program Director, Computer Science and Engineering
Project Summary:
This research is working to develop an automated truck stop management system that can compute occupancy rates at stops and notify drivers about the availability of parking spots using variable message displays located 30 to 40 miles before the stop. The system is designed to detect, classify, and localize vehicles on the truck stop's grounds using a set of video cameras from which video frames are analyzed in real time. Since precise knowledge of which spots are occupied will be available, variable message displays at the site of the stop itself will be able to direct drivers to free spots. In some cases it would be possible for two or more smaller vehicles to share a single parking spot, the system will also determine partial spot occupancy. The system operates in two basic modes (a day mode and a night mode) which would typically require different methods for vehicle detection. In order for vehicle dimensions to be accurately estimated, the managed parking spots will be calibrated so that the correspondence between the camera views and actual site dimensions are available.
Sponsor:
Project Details:
- Start date: 06/2008
- Project Status: Active
- Research Area: Transportation Safety and Traffic Flow
- Topics: Vision Systems