Title: Simulation of a Real-Time Bus Arrival Predictor using

RFID and LabVIEW

Description:
Most college and office goers in India use the public buses for daily commuting. The bus
network caters to the need of thousands who find it an affordable means of transport.
However, the absence of real-time updates in the system poses some very serious
problems during the exit period. Large cohorts leave the workplace at the same time,
leading to over-crowding, chaos and accidents at local bus stops. To address this issue,
we have designed an RFID based system that alerts the commuter at periodic intervals
as his desired bus approaches the stop.
Products:
LabVIEW 2010,
The Challenge:
The commuter has to send his preferred destination by SMS, and the real-time location
of relevant buses approaching the stop is sent to the commuter. Also, an LED display at
the local bus stop will display real-time information (route, destination etc.) about all
approaching buses, within a radius of 6km. Such a system needs a central server to
record and sort updates, and distribute them as per request. The server for each local
stop is to be installed in the college/workplace itself, so that it can be monitored and
updated by the students/workers with a basic knowledge of LabVIEW.
The concept is modular, in the way that it can be developed for individual colleges and
offices, and then interfaced and extended if necessary. To start with, we have automated
our college bus stand. Before we began work with long-range RFID onreal buses and
the bus stop, we decided to develop a scaled-down for concept validation.
The Solution:
The proposed model is illustrated

Let us consider each block in detail.

1. RFID Tag: These are installed on-board each bus. Every RFID tag has a unique id:
this corresponds to the bus number. The tag id and bus number are equated in a Look-
Up-Table in the server. We are using long-range,Gen-2 RFID tags for the model
(operation at 900 MHz). These tags have a read range of 8m. For the concept validation
stage, we used short range tags (125Khz) that had read range of 5 cm.

2. RFID Reader: These are installed at periodic intervals before our college bus stand
(5km, 3km, 1km). The operational model is a long-range reader that can intercept tag
data from buses that are passing by.

3. GSM Module 1: The RFID reader is interfaced to a GSM module through a PIC
microcontroller. The microcontroller is programmed to send relevant AT commands to
the GSM module every time a new tag is read.
4. GSM Module 2: The GSM module 1 sends tag data to the GSM Module 2.This
module is serially connected to the LabVIEW enabled server. Also, this module receives
requests from commuters and sends them relevant updates.

5. LabVIEW enabled server: This is the central unit of the system. It assigns tag ids to
bus numbers, sorts them as per routes, identifies and interprets commuter requests,
and sends the commuter updates via the attached GSM module.The uploaded
LabVIEW code illustrates its operation.

6. LED Module: Due to paucity of funds, we have not been able to erect an LCD
module at college. However, we have developed a VI that displays real-time updates of
all buses approaching the bus stop. The VI runs on a public computer in each
department of the college.

By
K. Ravi Babu
K. Niranjan Kumar