Smart bus by using GPS

Abstract

The objective of this project is to locate moving vehicles in order to enable tracking them by the dispatching center. We also aimed at enabling the access to the position information by the public through the Internet. The mobility of accessing those information is one of our concern as well. This project will make use of the Global Positioning System (GPS) to locate moving vehicles. GPS system consists of 24 satellites that orbit around the earth, each satellite broadcast signals containing time and identifier codes. Through a GPS antenna, GPS receivers pickup and interpret the signals from multiple satellites. The receiver used in this project is GPS2020 which is one of the smallest GPS receivers in the world. For the GPS receiver to communicate with computers, communication protocol NMEA 0183 version 2.0 is used in GPS2020. The NMEA sentences consists information about position, speed, and direction of travel of the GPS unit. These sentences are sent through an RS-232 serial port. Vehicles can send their position information to the dispatching center with the new mobile technology, General Packet Radio Service (GPRS). What it needs in order to use the GPRS service to access the Internet is a Wireless Modem Card (PCMCIA card) which is already in the market. We simulate this part by using Wireless LAN implemented in our campus. This project implements both the hardware and software part of this system. For the hardware part, circuit is designed to interface the GPS2020 with the RS-232 serial port. Software is developed to receive position information from the GPS receiver and send it to the dispatching center by using the GPRS service of the mobile phone. This system benefits the transport companies, for example, bus, to locate their vehicles. It can help to dispatch in a more efficient and effective way and the bus dispatching information could be easily obtained by the public through the Internet.