Ford Ends the Parallel Parking Nightmare
February 1, 2009
I avoid parallel parking with every ounce of my being. I haven’t attempted a parallel parking maneuver since drivers’ ed in high school. It’s true! So I was really impressed to learn that Ford is introducing an Active Park Assist feature on the 2010 Lincoln MKS, which will be available in summer 2009.
I know what you’re thinking: “Didn’t Lexus already introduce this feature?” Well, yes and no. Ford’s system uses ultrasonic-based sensors and electric power assisted steering to position your car for parallel parking, calculates the optimal steering angle and quickly steers the car into a parking spot with the touch of a single button. This technology is supposed to be a step above the Lexus system which utilizes video cameras to determine how to steer the vehicle. According to Ford execs, the system works faster and more accurately than the Lexus system, and should be less expensive as well.
In addition to helping ease parallel parking woes, the system also increases fuel economy by up to 5 percent while reducing emissions and enhancing performance, compared with traditional steering, Ford says.
“This is technology not for the sake of technology,” said Ali Jammoul, Ford’s chief engineer for chassis engineering and steering systems, “but technology designed to meet the needs and wants of customers.”
If a Lincoln MKS is not in your price range, you will be happy to know that by 2012, Ford plans to fit nearly 90 percent of its Ford, Lincoln and Mercury lineup with this system, putting it within reach for the masses.
Source: http://www.motherproof.com
Tags: fuel economy, parallel parking, technologyRelated Posts:
Number Plate Recognition Technology
October 13, 2008
Recent advances in Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) technologies have lead to a greater acceptance of the technology by car-park operators. The new digital ANPR technologies present greater read rates than traditional CCTV/PC based technologies and offer far greater flexibility in deployment and customization than previously available. By attaching a unique signature to every vehicle entering and exiting a car park the potential of a car-park management system is greatly enhanced. The signature widely used by vehicle identification technologies is usually the registration number displayed on the front and rear of the vehicle. To robustly read this plate in all weather conditions, day and night and to increase the ability of a system to read dirty plates, Alpha Vision Design has developed a stand alone digital ANPR station that can extract the registration number and automatically present the number for processing. The applications of ANPR technologies can be used for tolling, police enforcement, journey time analysis, average speed violation and access control. Within the car parking domain, most car park operators use ANPR technology as a medium to locate lost vehicles, to calculate occupancy times and to dramatically decrease the revenue loss associated with ticket fraud. ANPR is also finding favour within non-supervised car parks as a means to control access via a white list. This white list contains a list of vehicles with known access rights. Suitable for hotel, apartment and company car parks, this negates the use of disposable paper tickets and wireless FOBs. Companies with large fleets are introducing ANPR as a cost effective method of tracking their vehicles throughout their depots. Large supermarkets and chains are also beginning to utilize the information obtained from their car-parks as a way of highlighting demographic patterns with a view to maximizing profits. For any traffic management system to be a success, the read rate must exceed 99%. Traditionally most operators shied away from ANPR when they discovered that their true read rates were rarely above 60%. In real world applications, this was the limit, not due to poor software but the result of using conventional CCTV systems to obtain the images. CCTV technology is 50 years old and does not lend itself well to computer recognition systems. The common processing core for CCTV based ANPR systems is a PC. CCTV/PC based systems are not robust and are unacceptably high maintenance. To counter this, Alpha Vision Design has developed a self-contained ANPR system designed specifically for the car parking industry. This system includes an integrated illuminator, high resolution digital camera, digital analyser and on-board relays, all contained in one standard security housing. Only mounting and a power cable is required – an industry first! A high resolution camera obtains images that are over sixteen times larger in area size than CCTV images. Combined with a wider field of view, now only one camera is required to capture both the registration plate and an overview of the vehicle, and vehicle placement within a lane is no longer an issue which leads to greater capture rates. The camera /computer unit can in real time adjust the exposure, gain, and the integrated on-board IR lighting to maximise the contrast and readability of the registration plate, including dirty plates, variations in plate reflectivity, strong headlamps and adverse weather conditions. This cannot be done with CCTV/PC based ANPR systems. The setup is easy and is only required once per site, with no re-configuration necessary even after a power outage as the system will reboot automatically. On a typical 800 bay car-park, the system can also store up to five years of data, capturing and time stamping an image of every vehicle entering and exiting the facility. The system is true Plug & Play and can directly control a parking barrier via its on-board database and integrated relays. For configuration, simply use any standard web browser to manage the ANPR station – no third party software is required to manage the entire ANPR network. Our standard systems are shipped in three versions. We have an ANPR station designed for operating at a 10 meter and 25 meter range, and a system for high speed traffic applications. All systems are pre configured and only mounting is required. The ANPR stations can act stand alone or integrate with an existing parking entry ticket/gate system. For remote applications, the ANPR station can also be configured to run over GPRS, TCP/IP and WIFI Networks.
http://www.parkingireland.ie/showart6.htm
Alpha Vision Design
Website: www.ait-traffic.com
Phone+353-1-4640332
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Safe Parking, a Picture to Remember
September 6, 2008
““ for accounting, control and access of cars at parking places. New development won’t take the duty off a parking attendant, however, it will make his life much more easier. Smart development identifies car’s number and opens parking gates in front of it, but only if the car has the right to leave or enter the parking area. Moreover, “Tral Parking”, how the system in called, never takes doubtful decisions and never hesitates to contact the operator, when it needs help, taking photo of every car, passing the gates of the parking place.
The core of the device is digital video-recorder “Tral”, developed ten years ago by “SMP” company. This year’s innovation in “Tral Parking”, demonstrated during MIPS-2007 ehxibition, recently held in Moscow. We shall try to describe the system in simple terms, avoiding technical details. “Tral Parking” consists of several parts: first, it has “eyes” – two videocameras, first one watching carsm entering the parking place, and the second – keeping a eye on cars, leaving the shelter. Having a car in its field of vision, the camera transfers its image to system’s “think factory” – “Tral Parking”, a video-recorder looking like a portable but promising computer.
Now it’s time for panegyrics – the device is able to receive video-signals from several cameras simultaneously and analyses signals my means of original software. First, it scans the image and finds car number – white rectangle of given size with figures. Then, the device identifies car nuber and compares it with its database – if the number exists in “Tral”’s database, the gates open, and the car gets the access to the parking place, actuating car pass sensor and a photocamera, saving car image to video-recorder’s memory.
Scrupulous developers have foreseen the situation, when computer fail to identify car number, for instance, in case, when the number is covered with dirt or snow. Then computer refers to “next higher authority” – to a parking guard. A guard sees the car on his monitor, where TRAL’s cameras transfer car image, and can permit it to enter the parking place manually. Nevertheless, in this case car’s image is also saved in the database. Video-recorder and guard’s personal computer can communicate online via either local network, or Wi-Fi adapter – this is a boast of system developers. “Tral” recorders are able to register signals of 4 cameras simultaneously, offering multifold possibilities for users.
System’s archive – database and car images – is stored on a flash drive. The video-recoder is small and can be installed directly into parking gates, because it works in wide temperature range (from –20 to +55 degrees Centigrade). System’s database and archive can be reached remotely, via nerwork. “Tral” records car images with exact time of leavingentering the parking place, thus leaving no opportunities for passing near sleepless electronic guarg unnoticed. Soon parking guards will have a new assistant – smart, alert and honest “Tral Parking”.
Source: http://www.russia-ic.com
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