K. Kayama, I.E. Yairi, and S. Igi (Japan)
Intelligent Systems, Pedestrian Mobility Support, Environ ment Recognition, Outdoor Vehicle
We have been developing an Intelligent City Walker (ICW), which is one element of the Robotic Communica tion Terminals (RCT) project. The objective of the RCT project is to support pedestrians comprehensively. ICW is a user-carrying intelligent wheeled vehicle based on a com mercial electric scooter for outdoor use. In addition to assisting the locomotion of users, ICW can receive information such as geographic information relevant to pedestrians and the trajectories of nearby mov ing objects from other RCT terminals. It can also recog nize surrounding environments using its own sensors. This collected information is accessible to the user via a touch panel monitor mounted on the front of the ICW. There are three display modes: ordinary, sensor information, and map. Users can select the appropriate mode according to the situation. The displayed information was evaluated in a trial in which ordinary citizens participated. The results showed that there is a great demand for geographic infor mation and that coarse information about the surrounding environment is sufÞcient. Moreover, a questionnaire dis tributed after another field experiment on public roads re vealed that there is a demand for an affordable price com parable to an existing normal electric buggy, without con sidering safety and maneuverability.
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