I had to read the
press release more than once to make sense of
ABI Research's latest prognostications about the growth of the LBS market and its use of "real-time two-way" (RTTW) communication for navigation systems. Boiled down to simple terms, RTTW means having two communication system on one device. The first might be the GPS receiver to support navigation; the second a celluar radio to receive traffic information. Regardless of the form, the result is predicted to be explosive growth. From the release, "Handset-based navigation, where the navigation processing is conducted off-board (not on the handset) is one form of RTTW connected navigation, and it will experience explosive growth. Off-board navigation will go from under half a million users worldwide at the end of 2006 to more than 70 million at the end of 2012."
In cases of roadway congestion, traffic accidents, and so on, if multiple drivers equipped with two-way communication along the same stretch of stopped or slow traffic were sending back information about the roadway conditions as captured by their on-board GPS systems, that information could be processed and used to transmit information back to other drivers to advise them and reroute them long before official DOT or other traffic advisories were even published.
Additionally, that information could be spatially and temporally modeled to predict rush-hour slowdowns and bottlenecks and be used to divert motorists around bad traffic zones as a living, dynamic model.
We're just scratching the surface.