Sensor fusion for passenger conveyance control

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10074017-B2
Application number	US-201615089628-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 4, 2016
Priority date	Apr 3, 2015
Publication date	Sep 11, 2018
Grant date	Sep 11, 2018

Abstract

A fusion based passenger tracking system includes one or more 2D/3D sensors for capturing 2D/3D data; one or more security sensors for capturing security data; and a processing module in communication with the one or more 2D/3D sensors to receive the 2D/3D data, and the one or more security sensors to receive the security data, the processing module uses the 2D/3D data and the security data to calculate passenger data to generate a passenger tracking list that tracks each individual passenger in the passenger data.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A fusion based passenger tracking system for operating a passenger conveyance system in response to a traffic list, the system comprising:
one or more 2D/3D sensors for capturing 2D/3D data, wherein at least one of the one or more 2D/3D sensors for capturing 2D/3D data is located in at least one of one or more passenger conveyance waiting areas adjacent to a passenger conveyance system and one or more passenger conveyance enclosures;
one or more security sensors for capturing security data, wherein at least one of the one or more security sensors for capturing security data is interspersed with the one or more 2D/3D sensors for capturing 2D/3D data, the security data fused with the 2D/3D data to facilitate passenger conveyance dispatching; and
a processing module in communication with the one or more 2D/3D sensors to receive the 2D/3D data, and the one or more security sensors to receive the security data, the processing module uses the 2D/3D data and the security data to calculate passenger data to generate a passenger tracking list that tracks each individual passenger in the passenger data to predict a potential movement of the individual passenger.

2. The system as recited in claim 1 , wherein the 2D/3D data is 3D sensor data from a depth-sensing sensor.

3. The system as recited in claim 2 , wherein the depth-sensing sensor comprises a structured light measurement, phase shift measurement, time of flight measurement, stereo triangulation device, sheet of light triangulation device, light field cameras, coded aperture cameras, computational imaging techniques, simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM), imaging radar, imaging sonar, scanning LIDAR, flash LIDAR, Passive Infrared (PIR) sensor, and small Focal Plane Array (FPA), or a combination comprising at least one of the foregoing.

4. The system as recited in claim 3 , wherein the security data includes at least one of facial recognition, badge identification, fingerprint identification, voice recognition, biometric recognition, mobile phone recognition, Bluetooth recognition, WiFi device recognition, RFID recognition, and iris recognition.

5. The system as recited in claim 1 , wherein the security data is fused with the 2D/3D data.

6. The system as recited in claim 5 , wherein the fusion is by Bayesian estimation.

7. The system as recited in claim 6 , wherein the security data includes an identification.

8. The system as recited in claim 7 , wherein the security data is encrypted and access to the security data requires authentication.

9. The system as recited in claim 8 , wherein the passenger tracking list is communicated to a security system.

10. A method of passenger tracking for a passenger conveyance system, the method comprising:
tracking an individual passenger upon entry into an origin tracking area;
tracking the individual passenger while within a passenger conveyance enclosure of a passenger conveyance system from the origin tracking area;
tracking the individual passenger from the passenger conveyance enclosure through a destination tracking area to generate a traffic list;
predicting potential movement of the individual passenger from the traffic list; and
operating the passenger conveyance system in response to the traffic list.

11. The method as recited in claim 10 , further comprising combining one or more traffic lists for each individual passenger over time.

12. The method as recited in claim 11 , further comprising combining one or more traffic lists for each of a one or more individual passenger over time.

13. The method as recited in claim 12 , further comprising combining one or more traffic lists for each of a one or more individual passenger over time with time as a parameter to facilitate statistical distribution determination of passenger conveyance usage for at least one of an entire building, passenger conveyance daily load estimation, and passenger conveyance system diagnostics.

14. The method as recited in claim 13 , further comprising fusing the 2D/3D data and the security data.

15. The method as recited in claim 14 , further comprising fusing the data by Bayesian estimation.

16. The method as recited in claim 15 , further comprising controlling a passenger conveyance system in response to the fused data.

17. The method as recited in claim 14 , further comprising communicating the fused data to at least one of a security system and security personnel.

18. The method as recited in claim 17 , further comprising encrypting the data and authenticating access to the data.

19. The method as recited in claim 18 , wherein the tracking is by at least one of 2D/3D data and security data.

20. The system as recited in claim 1 , wherein the passenger tracking list tracks each individual passenger in the passenger data from an original lobby to when the passenger leaves a destination lobby, and through an in-car track between the origin lobby and the destination lobby, the processing module combining one or more passenger traffic lists over time to generate a statistical distribution determination of passenger conveyance usage to predict a potential movement of the individual passenger.

21. The system as recited in claim 1 , wherein the passenger conveyance usage is for at least one of an entire building, a passenger conveyance daily load estimation, and a passenger conveyance system diagnostics.

22. The method as recited in claim 10 , wherein operating the passenger conveyance system in response to the traffic list comprise passenger conveyance dispatching.

Assignees

• Otis Elevator Co

Inventors

• Jia Zhen
• Fang Hui
• Hsu Arthur
• Finn Alan Matthew

Classifications

• B66B5/0012

  Devices monitoring the users of the elevator system · CPC title

• G06K9/00778 Primary

  Physics · mapped topic

• B66B3/02

  Position or depth indicators · CPC title

• B66B13/146

  method or algorithm for controlling doors · CPC title

• B66B1/3476 Primary

  Load weighing or car passenger counting devices (B66B5/14 takes precedence) · CPC title