Ireneusz Celiński

The article proposes a concept for a mobile robot designed to detect hazardous and explosive materials in airport parking lots. The problem with operating such a robot is twofold. Firstly, it must move in a dynamic environment, between vehicles that are parked or also in motion, but without stopping vehicles that are in motion. The second problem is the detection of hazardous and explosive materials. For robot mobility solutions, an obstacle analysis system based on popular, low-cost LIDAR sensors and cameras was proposed. For the detection of hazardous and explosive materials, a dual vehicle monitoring system was proposed for airport parking lots. The first is based on vision techniques, where cameras and image recognition procedures are used to examine the undercarriages of parked vehicles. This system is designed to detect unusual objects mounted on vehicle undercarriages. The second is based on the analysis of volatile substances produced by explosives and hazardous materials found under or inside car chassis and gasoline and oils. The aim of the project is to develop a functional prototype of such a robot and describe its capabilities. The article describes the preliminary findings of the research.

Off-road vehicles, including those intended for mountain tourism, are also designed for people with special needs. These designs primarily concern the design of the drive of the vehicle, which can be manual, foot-powered, electric or a combination of these. Unusual forms of controlling these vehicles are also used, which use various parts of the body for this purpose, including the torso. In addition to using specific parts of the body to control the vehicle, an alternative is to use vision for this purpose, such as through eye tracking and similar techniques. The problem with these applications is the high prices of the devices and software used. They are mainly implemented in military solutions. The cost of these forms of vehicle control is too high; often higher than the price of the vehicle. This article presents an overview of the broad concept and technical solutions used to control various vehicles using hardware that can interact with the organ of vision. An extremely cheap prototype of this type of solution for several dozen EUR is also proposed in this article. The device uses methods based on vision techniques using the OpenCV 4_11 library. The research results in this area are presented, stating that such control is efficient.

The navigation system for such a vehicle may use hardware solutions that differ in price, functionality, user-friendliness and problems associated with their operation. The navigation of such an off-road vehicle may be based on: GPS, LoRa wireless communication, and IMU inertial units. However, as the first half of 2024 has shown, this system is experiencing significant disruptions. In extreme situations, it may even be disabled (e.g. because of warfare). Where special-purpose off-road vehicles for PWSN are operated in mountainous terrain, especially on rocky ground with various structures, IMUs are particularly susceptible to errors building up during travel. This article addresses the research on the LoRa technology envisaged for implementation in a navigation system intended for this type of vehicle. Given the foregoing premises, it is crucial to determine the possibility of effective exchange of information in the transmitter-receiver system using the LoRa protocol for purposes of communication in difficult mountainous terrain, in the presence of obstacles, and often under harsh weather conditions. The pilot studies discussed in this article were conducted with the above problems in mind. This article formulates assumptions for a navigation system based on the LoRa standard. Based on the studies conducted by the authors, both the implementation validity as well as the advantages and disadvantages of the solution proposed have been described. The research results imply that the solution in question can be treated as an alternative if the GPS signal is either unavailable or significantly disturbed, and its additional features provide significant support for PWSN using off-road vehicles.

This article addresses the issue of measuring and analyzing pedestrian traffic characteristics in real time. The proposed methodology employs standard, low-cost web cameras, which are temporarily installed at selected pedestrian crossings in Katowice. In subsequent stages of the research, cameras will be deployed at signalized pedestrian intersections, with their locations optimized according to the adopted measurement procedures. In this context, the spatial positioning of the camera is a critical factor that affects the quality of data and the quality of the measurement. The primary objective of the measurements presented is to analyze pedestrian traffic dynamics within the framework of a conceptual model describing the interactions between pedestrian and vehicular flows, as well as interpersonal interactions among pedestrians at intersections, with and without traffic signals. Here are some concepts for using such a model. The theoretical model will be elaborated in future publications. The present article focuses on the development and implementation of the real-time automatic data acquisition method that supports this modeling approach. Real-time data collection was conducted using computer vision techniques implemented with the OpenCV library and the Python programming language. The software system operates on the Windows platform, but can be run on any platform: Unix, MacOS. In the analysis, a comprehensive set of traffic parameters was employed that accounts for both the spatial and functional characteristics of the observed environment, as well as the behavioral patterns of pedestrian movement.

One of the foundations of Smart Cities is mobility. To manage the efficiency of urban mobility, continuous recording of traffic flows is essential. The road traffic parameters in the cross section of the road network can be registered with the use of various measurement technologies. This is indirectly due to the complexity of the phenomenon of vehicle traffic and the disturbances in physical quantities generated as a result of it. Traffic data carries: sound waves, vibrations, optical waves and other media. The characteristics of these physical media, properly recorded and mathematically transformed, may constitute a superposition of the position of individual vehicles moving in the traffic flow. Moreover, these waves interfere with each other depending on the observed parameters of the movement of individual vehicles at different places of the network. In this context, information obtained from various media is the overall view of traffic. This article focuses on acquiring infrared traffic data. The movement of each vehicle, regardless of its type, is inextricably linked to infrared radiation, the distribution changing as a function of the road network. Each vehicle is a source of heat and therefore also emits infrared radiation (it heats up gradually while driving, with small temperature fluctuations). Therefore, the temperature of a moving vehicle is generally different from the background (road network) temperature. This article presents a successful attempt to analyze the infrared radiation accompanying road traffic in a selected cross section of the road. In order to register infrared radiation in the traffic stream, a prototype of a measuring system consisting of a pyrometer commonly used in thermometers (cost about 10 € and less) was used. Measurements of infrared radiation of the vehicle stream obtained in this way were compared with the measurement data of handheld traffic recorders, the so-called mechanical vehicle counters. The comparison of the results from both recording methods allows for the formulation of further research hypotheses towards extended research in the field of infrared radiation of the traffic stream. In this regard, it is important to research with various disturbances in the measurements that come from other heat sources located in the road network and its immediate vicinity. This study is important from the point of view of smart cities and C-ITS systems (mainly V2I communication). The registration of data describing the traffic flow with the use of a single pyrometer, instead of an expensive IR camera, is a cheap alternative in modern city information networks. This allows you to create intelligent sensor networks using connectivity based on, e.g., mesh networks. Such activities are possible with costs for one measuring point reduced by one or two orders of magnitude compared to the costs incurred with the use of IR cameras ( € 1000, € 10,000 and more). In the current situation of the energy crisis, the search for innovative solutions with lower energy demand is very important in the Smart City policy.

In recent decades, the dynamics of road vehicle traffic have significantly evolved, compelling traffic engineers to develop innovative traffic monitoring solutions, especially for dense road networks. Traditional methods for measuring traffic volume along road sections may no longer suffice for modern traffic control systems. This is particularly true for induction loops, a widely used method since the last century. In contrast, measuring techniques using microwaves or visible light offer better accuracy but are often hindered by the high cost of sensors. This paper presents new techniques for measuring traffic flow and other parameters that adapt to changing traffic dynamics using low-cost optical distance sensors. Our study demonstrates that the integration of multiple monitoring approaches enhances measurement accuracy, contingent on the dynamics and specific characteristics of the traffic. The results indicate that cheap optical distance sensors are particularly well suited for use in smart city road networks.