Dynamic Location Management for On-Demand Car Sharing System

• Published in: Knowledge-Based Intelligent Information and Engineering Systems pp. 768 - 774
• Main Authors: Mukai, Naoto, Watanabe, Toyohide
• Format: Book Chapter Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin, Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2005; Springer
• Series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science
• Subjects: Applied sciences; Artificial intelligence; Computer science; control theory; systems; Exact sciences and technology; Goal Node; Location Controller; Occurrence Rate; Road Segment; Service Area; Availability; Motor car; GPS system; Transportation system; Radiolocalisation; Localization; Artificial intelligence; Public transportation
• ISBN: 3540288945; 9783540288947
• ISSN: 0302-9743; 1611-3349
• DOI: 10.1007/11552413_109

Recently, Car Sharing System is focused as a new public transportation system in Japan. However, traditional car sharing systems which we call Pre-Reserve Car Sharing System require advance reservations, and the number of stations where users get on/off for the systems is small. Thus, the number of users is limited availability and most of users only apply the system to round driving. On the other hand, the advances of global positioning systems and communication techniques improve the system in a new and different way. We call the new system On-Demand Car Sharing System. In the new system, users are available for the system on demand, i.e., users can get on/off any time and any stations. Thus, users apply the system to one-way driving in addition to round driving. In this paper, we focus on location balances of cars which is a key factor to improve utilization rate of the system. We propose a relocation algorithm for waiting cars based on virtual spring forces. In the last of this paper, we report our simulation results and show the effectiveness of our algorithm.