Route engineering technique

Details Route engineering technique Route engineering technique

1999-08-03

2001-03-20

Zanelli, Michael J. (Department: 3661)

Data processing: vehicles, navigation, and relative location

Navigation

Determination of travel data based on the start point and...

C701S213000, C342S357490

Reexamination Certificate

active

06205397

ABSTRACT:

TECHNICAL FIELD
This invention relates to a technique for automatically routing a utility conveyance, such as a pipe or cable, between a starting point and endpoint to avoid known obstructions.
BACKGROUND ART
Utilities that provide water, gas and sewer services typically maintain large networks of pipes most if not all of which are buried underground. In a similar fashion, electrical utilities and providers of telecommunications services, such as AT&T, maintain vast networks of cables, most of which are also buried underground. Increasing demand requires providers of gas, electric, water and telephone service to continually install new pipes and cables (hereinafter, “utility conveyances”) to meet customer needs. Installation of a new buried conveyance, such as a fiber optic cable in the case of a telecommunications service provider, is not a trivial task. First, an engineer must obtain a physical map of the area encompassing the starting point and endpoint for the cable. Thereafter, the engineer must decide on a route, taking into account the availability of existing right-of-ways and the ability to obtain new right-of ways, as necessary. Having selected a potential route, the cable engineer must take into account any obstacles, such as rivers, lakes, and streets, for example, as well as any existing utility conveyances running along the proposed route. Once having selected a proposed, the engineer will actually walk, or otherwise traverse the route as a last check before installation commences.
The process of engineering a route for a buried utility conveyance is very tedious, requiring significant manual effort by the engineer to scrutinize the map in order lay out the proposed route while taking into account various obstacles. Moreover, the accuracy of the proposed route depends in large measure on the accuracy of the physical map used by the engineer to select the route. While great care is taken to accurately map existing obstacles along the proposed right-of-way of a planned cable or pipe, inaccuracies can and do occur, adversely affecting the proposed route.
Thus, there is a need for a technique for facilitating route engineering of a buried underground utility conveyance.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Briefly, the present invention provides a method for automatically routing a utility conveyance. The method commences upon the selection of a starting point and endpoint between which the conveyance is to run. Once the starting and endpoints are selected, a determination is made automatically whether an available right-of-way exists between the starting and endpoints. In practice, such a determination is made by establishing the Global Positioning Satellite Coordinates for the starting and endpoints, and then comparing the GPS coordinates of the available right-of-ways to the GPS coordinates of the starting and endpoints. If an available right-of-way exists between the starting and endpoints, then a route is automatically mapped along the available right-of-way. After automatically mapping a proposed route between the starting and endpoints, each obstacle that exists on the proposed route is automatically identified. In practice, the GPS coordinates of each obstacle are compared to those of the automatically mapped route. If the obstacle lies within the automatically mapped route, the obstacle is identified for further consideration.


REFERENCES:
patent: 5119317 (1992-06-01), Narikawa et al.
patent: 5504685 (1996-04-01), Wapner
patent: 5691903 (1997-11-01), Racette, III
patent: 5720354 (1998-02-01), Stump et al.
patent: 5904210 (1999-05-01), Stump et al.
West et al.; Terrain based routing of distribution cables; IEEE-Computer Applications in Power; vol. 10, iss. 1; Jan. 1997; pp. 42-26.

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