WO2009091258A1

WO2009091258A1 - Transportation control system

Info

Publication number: WO2009091258A1
Application number: PCT/NL2009/050023
Authority: WO
Inventors: Johannes Albertus Vogel
Original assignee: Nederlandse Organisatie Voor Toegepast-Natuurwetenschappelijk Onderzoek Tno
Priority date: 2008-01-18
Filing date: 2009-01-19
Publication date: 2009-07-23

Abstract

A system (10) for controlling transportation in an area (A) comprises a monitoring unit (11) for obtaining environmental data and/or traffic data, request input units (12) for inputting transportation requests (TR) including starting point and/or destination data, an offers input unit (13) for inputting transportation offers (TO), and a matching unit (14) for matching transportation requests and transportation offers and associated prices. The matching unit (14) is further arranged for adding a surcharge depending on any undesired effects of the transportation. The system may further comprise an intervention unit (16) for carrying out traffic interventions, such as speed limits and lane control.

Description

Transportation Control System

The present invention relates to a transportation control system. More in particular, the present invention relates to a method and system for arranging and controlling transportation in an area, while minimising the impact of the transportation, such as the emissions impact and/or the noise impact.

Several transportation control systems are already known from the Prior Art. However, none of these known systems appears to provide an integral solution which allows a dynamic traffic control involving the impact of the transportation, such as the pollution costs.

European Patent Application EP 1 202 233 discloses a traffic control system for controlling access to a dedicated restricted access road, such as a motorway. The time at which road vehicles may depart from a departure point on the dedicated road is controlled by the system. Effectively, a departure time interval is assigned to each road vehicle. This known system may be managed by an operator who may allocate an assignment to the highest bidder. All bidders are vehicle operators. The system is only limited by road capacity while other restraints, such as the emissions of the road vehicles, are not taken into account.

European Patent Application EP 1 610 244 discloses a transportation management support system which includes an emission material calculating section to calculate the amount of emissions produced by individual transports. This known system is capable of determining the mutual effects of distribution cost reduction measures and emission reduction measures for transports once the source, destination and other data of a transport are known. There is no overall transportation control. United States Patent US 7 249 087 discloses a marketplace and management system for freight transportation. This known system acts as an intermediary between buyers and sellers of freight transportation. Although US 7 249 087 mentions fuel surcharges due to fuel price increases, pollution costs are not mentioned or suggested. In addition, there is no dynamic control in this known system as any feedback mechanism is absent.

British Patent Application GB 2 341 261 discloses a mobility services system, especially for conurbations, having a dispatching centre arranged for calculating a route for the mobility services. The users of this known system are suppliers and/or consumers of transport capacity in motor vehicles, using offer parameters and request parameters. The dispatching centre compares the offer parameters with the request parameters, letting the consumer select and book a mobility offer. Environmental impact is only minimised by the alleged efficiency of the system, not by additional measures. No support is given to the transport suppliers and no feedback mechanism is provided. The dispatching centre does not alter the offers or their parameters, nor does it influence the consumer's choices.

United States Patent Application US 2004/039517 discloses an integrated traffic surveillance system having devices for measuring environmental and weather data, traffic sensors, a traffic surveillance control centre and communication devices. To reduce environmental pollution, the known traffic surveillance system takes action to control a traffic system, including recommendations to road users and interventions in the vehicles. Emission data can be taken into consideration. There is no journey planning facility in this known system (except for the use of public transport as an alternative to a journey being undertaken by car) and the system only influences journeys which are already en route. The known system does not guide the choices of the consumers.

United States Patent Application US 2002/072963 discloses a traffic information and pricing system which can be used for imposing several types of traffic fees. It is possible to charge for fuel consumption, noise production, and/or the environmental pollution caused. A traffic fee is calculated and is collected from vehicles by an authority. There is no journey planning facility in this known system, it only applies to journeys which are already en route. It is an object of the present invention to overcome these and other problems of the Prior Art and to provide a system and method for controlling transportation which allows journey planning while taking environmental effects into account. More in particular, the present invention seeks to improve a system of the type disclosed in above-mentioned GB 2 341 261 by taking environmental factors into account and using feedback of the measures taken by the system to further improve its performance. Accordingly, the present invention provides a system for controlling transportation in an area, the system comprising: a monitoring unit arranged for obtaining monitoring data relating to traffic conditions in the area, - a request input unit arranged for receiving transportation requests from requesting parties, an offer input unit arranged for receiving transportation offers from offering parties, a matching unit arranged for matching transportation requests and transportation offers using their respective routes and prices and thus granting transportation requests, characterised in that: the monitoring unit is further arranged for obtaining monitoring data relating to environmental conditions in the area, in that - the system further comprises: o an effects prediction unit arranged for predicting, depending upon the monitoring data relating to both environmental and traffic conditions, any environmental effects and traffic effects of the transportation offers, and o an intervention unit arranged for carrying out traffic interventions, and in that the matching unit is further arranged for minimising any undesired environmental and/or traffic effects in the area by: o adding, on the basis of the predicted environmental effects and traffic effects, a surcharge to the price of transportation offers, depending upon any undesired environmental and/or traffic effects of the respective transportation offer, and o controlling the intervention unit, in dependence upon the predicted environmental effects and traffic effects of the granted transportation requests.

By making the monitoring unit suitable for obtaining monitoring data relating to both traffic effects (for example congestion) and environmental effects (for example noise and/or air pollution), these environmental effects can be taken into account. By providing an effects prediction unit, the environmental and/or traffic effects of the transportation offers (and/or transportation requests) can be predicted. By providing an intervention unit, direct interventions in the traffic (such as lane closures, detours and/or traffic light control) are made possible and specific rights (such as exclusive lane use) may be granted.

By making the matching unit additionally suitable for adding surcharges to the transportation offers depending upon the predicted environmental effects and traffic effects, transportation offers having undesirable effects can be made more expensive and hence less likely to be accepted. Preferably an effects compensation unit is provided for determining the surcharge, using the predicted effects of the offered (and/or requested transportation as input.

In addition to this price mechanism, which influences the chosen route and the means of transportation, the intervention unit can intervene in the traffic to further reduce any undesired effects, for example by limiting the number and/or types of vehicles on a certain road section, by imposing speed limits and other (temporary or permanent) measures. The number of vehicles may be limited in general or per vehicle type (car, lorry, etc.).

It is noted that each transportation request and each transportation offer defines a journey from a starting point to a destination point, and will typically also define a time window in which the journey is to be made. In addition, an offer and/or request may define a means of transportation (car, train, bus, ship, etc.), a number of passengers, a payload, and other parameters.

In the system of the present invention, the effects prediction unit preferably uses at least one model for predicting the traffic effects and environmental effects of the transportation offers. The monitoring data, relating to both the environment and the traffic, are used as input to this model. Other models that may advantageously be used are traffic models and weather models, for example, or models that take human behavioural patterns into account. Using such a human behaviour model, the reactions of offering and requesting parties to any surcharge can be predicted, thus assisting in determining the amount of the surcharge. Similarly, a human behaviour model can be used to predict the reactions of offering and requesting parties to any traffic interventions. In this way, the amounts of the surcharges and the kinds of interventions can be determined accurately.

In embodiments in which a model is used that takes human behavioural patterns into account, the surcharge is added on the basis of both the predicted environmental and traffic effects and the predicted behaviour of the offering and requesting parties.

In addition to the monitoring data, transportation offers can be taken into account by the effects determination unit. Optionally, transportation requests may also, or alternatively, be taken into account. The matching unit is arranged for minimising the undesired environmental and/or traffic effects in the area by using a surcharge (making undesirable offers less attractive) and preferably interventions (controlling the traffic flow directly). The surcharge is preferably specific to a request, while the interventions may be more generic. In an advantageous embodiment, the matching unit is further arranged for limiting any undesired effects of all transportation in the area to a maximum value. That is, the surcharges and interventions are used in such a way that the undesired effects, predicted by the prediction unit depending upon the monitoring data, do not exceed a certain threshold value. In the present invention, all transportation in the area preferably corresponds to granted transportation requests.

The system of the present invention is dynamic in that the surcharges and interventions may be adjusted continually, in response to the effects of new monitoring data or other parameters, such as the time of day, or day of the week. It is preferred that surcharges of individual offers are only adjusted prior to their respective journeys, that is, before the match between an offer and a request has been made. This avoids any price changes during a journey, which many parties would not find acceptable. However, in some embodiments the surcharge may be adjusted after the match has been made but before the journey has started. Such an adjustment may result in an alternative match. In still other embodiments, the matching unit may alter the granted request (that is, the agreement between the offering and requesting parties) during the journey, provided both parties agree. The traffic interventions may be specific for a granted transportation request. In this way, a right can be coupled to a granted request: the right to travel on a certain lane, for example. In return, the requesting party has the obligation to pay any fees due. In certain embodiments, the rights can be traded: the requesting party's right to be transported under certain conditions can be sold to another requesting party.

Similarly, the offering party's right to transport under certain conditions may also be sold to another offering party.

As mentioned above, traffic interventions may comprise traffic lights control, lane closures, lane assignments, speed limits, and/or a combination of these measures.

The present invention also provides a method of controlling transportation in an area, the method comprising the steps of: obtaining monitoring data relating to traffic conditions in the area, receiving transportation requests from requesting parties, - receiving transportation offers from offering parties, matching transportation requests and transportation offers using their respective routes and prices and thus granting transportation requests, characterised by the steps of: obtaining monitoring data relating to environmental conditions in the area, - predicting, depending upon the monitoring data relating to both environmental and traffic conditions, the environmental effects and traffic effects of the transportation offers, and carrying out traffic interventions, wherein the matching step is designed for minimising any undesired environmental and/or traffic effects in the area by: adding, on the basis of the predicted environmental effects and traffic effects, a surcharge to the price of transportation offers, depending upon any undesired environmental and/or traffic effects of the respective transportation offer, and - controlling the traffic interventions, in dependence upon the predicted environmental effects and traffic effects of the granted transportation requests. The method of the present invention provides the same advantages as the system defined above.

The present invention additionally provides a computer program product for carrying out the method as defined above. A computer program product may comprise a set of computer executable instructions stored on a data carrier, such as a CD or a DVD. The set of computer executable instructions, which allow a programmable computer to carry out the method as defined above, may also be available for downloading from a remote server, for example via the Internet.

The present invention will further be explained below with reference to exemplary embodiments illustrated in the accompanying drawings, in which:

Fig. 1 schematically shows an exemplary embodiment of a system according to the present invention. Fig. 2 schematically shows an example of an area to which the present invention may be applied.

Fig. 3 schematically shows an exemplary embodiment of a matching unit used in the system of Fig. 1.

Fig. 4 schematically shows some exemplary steps of the method according to the present invention.

The system 10 shown merely by way of non-limiting example in Fig. 1 comprises a monitoring (MON) unit 11, a requests input (RI) unit 12, an offers input (OI) unit 13, a requests and offers matching unit 14, an effects prediction (EP) unit 15, an intervention (INT) unit 16, and an effects compensation (EC) unit 17.

The monitoring unit 11 is connected with first sensor units 31 and second sensor units 32 arranged in an area A, while the intervention unit 16 is connected with first signalling units 21 and second signalling units 22 (also known as actuators) which are also arranged in the area A. The first sensor units 31 may be fixed or mobile traffic sensors, e.g. arranged for measuring the number of vehicles using a certain road section, while the second sensor units 32 may be environmental sensors, e.g. arranged for measuring toxic gas and/or fine particles (also known as particulates) levels in the air. The first signalling units 21 may e.g. be traffic lights, while the second signalling units 22 may e.g. be controlled lane closure signs and/or speed limit signs. Alternatively, or additionally, the vehicles may be provided with actuators, for example for limiting the maximum speed of the vehicle. The area A may include a town, city, region, county, province or state, or part of such a geographic entity.

Transportation offering parties (OP) offer transportation at the offers input unit 13, which is connected to the matching unit 14 and the effect prediction unit 15. The transportation offers may include cars, lorries, trains, airplanes, ships and other means of transportation. In addition, the transportation offers may include facilities such as parking lots and temporary accommodation for waiting travellers. Although cars and roads are used as typical examples, the invention is not so limited.

A transportation offer will normally include a source or starting point, a destination, a maximum number of persons and/or a maximum pay load (in weight and/or volume), a time or time frame, and a price. Offers may be presented at the initiative of a transportation offering party, or in reply to an advertisement, for example an announcement made on a bulletin board, on a website, in an email message or other (electronic or physical) means of communications. The offers input unit may have a display screen and/or other arrangements for announcing transportation requests.

Transportation requesting parties (RP) can request transportation at the requests input unit 12, which is connected to the matching unit 14. These transportation requests may also include a source or starting point, a destination, a maximum number of persons and/or a maximum pay load (in weight and/or volume), a time or time frame, and a price.

It is noted that a plurality of requests input units 12 and offers input units 13 may be present, and that each of these units may be constituted by a software program running at a remote computer, connected to the matching unit 14 via a LAN, WAN or the Internet. However, dedicated terminals located close to the matching unit 14 may also be used. The monitoring unit 11 receives sensor data from traffic sensor units 31 and environmental sensor units 32 and stores the sensor data, at least temporarily. Monitoring information MI, represented by the sensor data, is passed on to the effects prediction unit 15, which also receives the transportation offers TO (in some embodiments, the effects prediction unit may additionally, or alternatively, receive the transportation requests TR). The effects prediction unit 15 uses one or more models, such as behavioural models and/or traffic models, to predict the traffic effects and environmental effects of the transportation offers TO, given the monitoring information MI. That is, a model is used to determine the impact of each transportation offer on both the traffic and the environment in the area A. The traffic aspects modelled may include the number of vehicles on certain road sections, the amount of congestion, the average speed, and/or other traffic -related factors. The environmental aspects may include the CO₂ content of the air (both locally and in the entire area A), the NO_x content of the air, the amount of fine particles in the air, the amount of noise, the risks involved in transporting dangerous goods, and/or other environmental factors. The monitoring information MI can additionally be communicated to the requests unit 12 and/or the offers unit 13 so as to inform the requesting and offering parties about the environmental and/or traffic conditions and thus influence their decisions before requests and offers are made. The effects prediction unit 15 may additionally include a model predicting the substitution of types of transportation given certain conditions.

The effects information EI resulting from the effects prediction is passed on to the matching unit 14 and to the effects compensation unit 17. It is noted that in some embodiments the effects compensation unit 17 may be omitted and that the effects information EI is consequently presented to the matching unit 14 only. In other embodiments, the effects information EI may be input into the effects compensation unit 17 only, in which case the matching unit 14 does not receive the effects information (but may receiving the monitoring information MI instead). The effects compensation unit 17 determines a suitable compensation for each transportation offer (and/or each transportation request) on the basis of the effects predicted by the effects prediction unit 15. The compensation may involve a surcharge added to the quoted price of a transportation offer (and/or a penalty applied to the quoted price of a transportation request), the amount of the surcharge depending on the amount of compensation required. That is, transportation offers having a high predicted environmental and/or traffic-related impact (that is, a high cost to society) will incur a high surcharge, while transportation offers having a low predicted environmental and/or traffic-related impact (that is, a low cost to society) will incur a low surcharge. In some cases, the compensation may be zero: no compensation is necessary and no surcharge is imposed, while in other cases the surcharge may be so high as to make the journey concerned economically unattractive. In addition to, or instead of surcharges, traffic interventions may be determined, such as lane restrictions, speed limits, traffic light control, and other measures. These traffic interventions can be specific for a particular offer or be generic, that is, apply to the traffic flow as a whole and be determined using suitable statistical techniques.

The matching unit 14 is arranged for matching transportation offers (TO) and transportation requests (TR) and producing granted transportation offers (GTO) and/or granted transportation requests (GTR). These granted offers and requests, which define journeys that will be carried out, are fed to the offers input unit 13 and the requests input unit 12 respectively. To take the impact of the transportation into account, the matching unit 14 receives compensation information CI from the effects compensation unit 17. In addition, the matching unit may receive effects information EI from the effects prediction unit 15 and/or monitoring information MI directly from the monitoring unit 11.

The surcharge, which is based upon the predicted effects of the intended transportation, is added to the price of each transportation offer before a match is attempted. Although some surcharges may be equal to zero (for example when a transportation offer involves a bicycle or public transportation), typical surcharges will be greater than zero. If the administrator of an area wishes to encourage a particular type of transport, for example public transportation, negative surcharges (that is, discounts) may be applied. The matching process may be carried out by well-known algorithms which take the prices, time (slots) and the overlapping journey sections of the respective offers and requests into account. In addition, other factors such as the number of people and the payload may also be taken into account.

The matching process preferably reflects an agreement between the offering and requesting parties. In some embodiments the process of producing an agreement ("contract") will be supported by the matching unit, while in other embodiments an agreement may already be in place.

The matching unit 14 may also produce intervention commands IC for carrying out traffic interventions using the intervention unit 16. The interventions supplement the matching by imposing restrictions such as speed limits or, conversely, granting privileges ("rights") such as exclusive lane use in a certain time slot. The matching unit may combine a surcharge and an intervention, the effects compensation unit 17 producing both a surcharge and a set of suitable interventions. A restriction, such as a speed limit, may result in a lower surcharge, but whether the restriction will be applied, and to what extent, will also depend on the traffic situation: a speed limit may not be desired at a certain time of the day.

A set of possible surcharges, a set of possible interventions, and any effects threshold values together constitute a policy, which is input into the matching unit 14 by an administrator. The policy preferably distinguishes between different types of transportation and includes sets of possible surcharges and interventions per transportation type.

The overall aim of the policy is to distribute the negative effects of the transportation in a fair manner over all participants, that is, all users (requesting parties) and all providers (offering parties) of the transportation.

The matching unit 14 may produce feedback information FI and feed this information, which may concern transportation matches made, to the effects prediction unit 15 so that the effects of the granted transportation offers and/or requests may be taken into account.

The intervention unit 16 is connected to the first signalling units 21 (e.g. traffic lights) and the second signalling units 22 (e.g. controlled lane closure signs and/or speed limit signs) so as to carry out traffic interventions. To this end, the intervention unit 16 receives intervention commands IC from the matching unit 14. In some embodiments, the intervention unit 16 may also receive intervention information II from the effects compensation unit 17, in addition to, or instead of, the intervention commands IC produced by the matching unit 14. In addition to the signalling (or actuator) units 21 and 22, on-board signalling units and/or vehicle control units may be provided in the vehicles for instructing the driver and directly controlling the vehicle respectively.

The merely exemplary area A of Fig. 1 is shown in more detail in Fig. 2. The area A is shown to comprise roads R, journey starting points S and journey destinations D. In some cases, the starting points S and the destinations D may be located outside the area A. An exemplary embodiment of the matching unit 14 of Fig. 1 is schematically illustrated in Fig. 3. The matching unit of Fig. 4 comprises a microprocessor 141 and an associated memory 142. The microprocessor 141 is capable of communicating with other units (possibly via an interface unit which is not shown in Fig. 3). The memory 142 is capable of holding both data and software programs for carrying out the method steps of the present invention.

Exemplary method steps according to the present invention are illustrated in Fig. 4. In monitoring step 51, the area A is monitored using sensor units and monitoring data are collected. In transportation input step 52, transportation offers and requests are input. In effects determination step 53, the effects of the monitoring data and of the intended transportation (offers and/or requests) are predicted, while in measures step 54 suitable measures are taken to control the traffic in accordance with a predetermined policy, such as threshold noise levels and/or air pollution levels. The measures may involve surcharges and/or traffic interventions. A feedback loop FB allows the effects of the measures to be determined and the effects prediction model to be adjusted.

Example 1:

A requesting party (RP in Fig. 1) specifies its request using a requests input unit 12. The matching unit 14 analyses the request and sends request parameters, such as the type of transportation, the desired time and date, the number of persons and/or the amount of goods involved, to an offers input unit 13 at which offering parties have indicated to be willing to provide transportation having these or similar parameters. The offers input unit may be shared by several offering parties, or may be specific for one offering party only and may, in the latter case, be located at the requesting party's premises. (It is noted that in this example, the offering parties are notified of requests in which they may be interested. To this end, the offering parties provide parameters which are suitable for "pre-matching". In other embodiments, the offering parties make offers without having knowledge of existing requests and are only notified if a final match, including a price match, has been made).

The offering parties then present one or more offers include the respective routes chosen by them, the types of vehicles used, and the prices at which they are willing to provide the requested transportation. This price may be the sum of a number of factors, such as length of the journey, time of the day, price per person/kilogram, multiplied by a rate. Via the offers input unit 13 this offer (including a route and a price) is sent to the matching unit 14, which collects all offers relating to the particular requests. Using the compensation information CI provided by the effects compensation unit 17, surcharges are added to the quoted prices, resulting in adjusted offers having adjusted quoted prices.

Then the matching unit attempts to find a match between the offers and the request, using the adjusted prices of the offers. If a match is found, that is, if an adjusted quoted price of an offer is smaller than or equal to the price of the request, the particular offering party is notified and receives further details. Alternatively, the match can be found by standard procurement techniques, such as auctions.

The matching unit sends the requesting party, via a request input unit or via other means, such as a mobile (cellular) telephone, a confirmation and details of the offering party. If necessary, the matching unit cancels any other offers involving the same vehicle in an overlapping time period. The matching unit keeps a record of all transactions (that is, all pairs of granted requests and granted offers) and may also settle the payments involved. The users of the system, that is the offering parties and the requesting parties, may be given the opportunity to evaluate the performance of the system (customer satisfaction evaluation). It may occur that no offers matching the request will be found. In that case the requesting party is notified and may be given the opportunity to change the parameters of the transportation request, in particular the (maximum) price. If a match between a transportation request and a transportation offer is made, mutual obligations are created: the obligation of the requesting party to pay the agreed price, and the obligation of the offering party to carry out the journey at the on the agreed terms (price, route, time, date, number of persons, etc.). The offering party may also be granted rights: the right to use a certain (reserved) lane, to travel at a certain speed, etc.. The matching unit may refuse parties which have not kept their obligations or which have abused their rights.

Example 2: A user needing transportation submits a transportation request by assigning values to a set of variables and sending this set of variables to the matching unit 14. The set of variables may include:

• A: the starting point of the journey,

• B: the destination of the journey, • t_v: the point in time at which the vehicle must be available at location A,

• Δt: the acceptable delay,

• P_k: the (maximum) price the requesting party (RP) is willing to pay,

• t_e: the point in time at which the price indicated by the RP expires,

• n: the number of people travelling, • m: the mass of the luggage,

• V: the volume of the luggage.

In this example, the requesting party has knowledge of the cost of transportation and has a reasonable price in mind. An indication of the price may have been provided by the matching unit, based upon previous matches. The acceptable delay Δt, which defines the interval from t_v to t_v+Δt in which the transportation has to take place, may be chosen large by requesting parties for which the particular time of arrival is less relevant.

The further procedure is similar to the one described in Example 1 , the requesting party paying the price of the best offer. If no suitable offer exists, the request lapses after a predetermined amount of time, or when the requesting party withdraws its request. In other embodiments the requesting party may already have a contract with a transport provider (offering party). The matching unit may in such embodiments have a limited role in that no "best" match is made. Still, the matching unit will in many cases impose a surcharge on the offer of the contracted party, and may also control traffic interventions. Examples of embodiments of this type include dynamic slot planning in which time slots are granted to parties, specific lanes are assigned or reserved during one or more time slots, the routing of dangerous goods, dynamic traffic control in general (e.g. the right of way at series of consecutive intersections), and distributing the traffic on busy roads. It will be clear from the above examples that the surcharge may be equal to zero, in which case the system of the present invention only has a regulating function (traffic control).

Although the present invention has been described with reference to vehicles, such as road vehicles (cars, lorries, buses, taxis), the invention is not so limited and may also be applied to trains, airplanes, ships, as examples of physical means of transportation. The present invention is also applicable to data transport as an example of non-physical means of transportation.

When using physical transportation, the present invention may also use a combination of transportation means: part of a journey may be carried out using a taxi, part by train, and another part by bus. Some parts of a journey may even be carried out on foot, if this is a suitable alternative. In addition to, or instead of minimising pollution, other factors may be taken into account, such as safety and comfort, which may be maximised. Safety may also include pedestrian safety.

The present invention is based upon the insight that a traffic system allows its users a maximum degree of freedom by using a price mechanism to match transportation request and transportation offers. The present invention benefits from the further insight that a surcharge, based upon predicted detrimental effects of the traffic, provides a suitable and flexible measure for influencing the price mechanism. It is noted that any terms used in this document should not be construed so as to limit the scope of the present invention. In particular, the words "comprise(s)" and "comprising" are not meant to exclude any elements not specifically stated. Single (circuit) elements may be substituted with multiple (circuit) elements or with their equivalents. Elements arranged for a certain task or purpose may also be said to be configured or designed for that task or purpose.

It will be understood by those skilled in the art that the present invention is not limited to the embodiments illustrated above and that many modifications and additions may be made without departing from the scope of the invention as defined in the appending claims.

Claims

1. A system (10) for controlling transportation in an area (A), the system comprising: - a monitoring unit (11) arranged for obtaining monitoring data relating to traffic conditions in the area, a request input unit (12) arranged for receiving transportation requests from requesting parties, an offer input unit (13) arranged for receiving transportation offers from offering parties, a matching unit (14) arranged for matching transportation requests and transportation offers using their respective routes and prices and thus granting transportation requests, characterised in that: - the monitoring unit (11) is further arranged for obtaining monitoring data relating to environmental conditions in the area, in that the system further comprises: o an effects prediction unit (15) arranged for predicting, depending upon the monitoring data relating to both environmental and traffic conditions, any environmental effects and traffic effects of the transportation offers, and o an intervention unit (16) arranged for carrying out traffic interventions, and in that the matching unit (14) is further arranged for minimising any undesired environmental and/or traffic effects in the area by: o adding, on the basis of the predicted environmental effects and traffic effects, a surcharge to the price of transportation offers, depending upon any undesired environmental and/or traffic effects of the respective transportation offer, and o controlling the intervention unit (16), in dependence upon the predicted environmental effects and traffic effects of the granted transportation requests.

2. The system according to claim 1, wherein the matching unit (14) is further arranged for limiting any undesired effects of all granted transportation requests in the area (A) to a maximum value.

3. The system according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the traffic interventions are specific for a granted transportation request.

4. The system according to any of the preceding claims, wherein traffic interventions may comprise traffic lights control, lane closures, lane assignments, and/or speed limits.

5. The system according to any of the preceding claims, further comprising an effects compensation unit (17) for determining surcharges and traffic interventions in dependence upon the predicted effects of the transportation.

6. The system according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the surcharge may be greater than, equal to or smaller than zero.

7. The system according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the surcharge can be varied in dependence upon associated interventions.

8. The system according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the effects prediction unit comprises a model that takes human behavioural patterns into account.

9. The system according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the monitoring unit (11) is arranged for monitoring fine particles levels.

10. The system according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the matching unit (14) comprises a microprocessor unit and an associated memory unit.

11. A method of controlling transportation in an area (A), the method comprising the steps of: obtaining monitoring data relating to traffic conditions in the area, receiving transportation requests from requesting parties, - receiving transportation offers from offering parties, matching transportation requests and transportation offers using their respective routes and prices and thus granting transportation requests, characterised by the steps of: obtaining monitoring data relating to environmental conditions in the area, - predicting, depending upon the monitoring data relating to both environmental and traffic conditions, any environmental effects and traffic effects of the transportation offers, and carrying out traffic interventions, wherein the matching step is designed for minimising any undesired environmental and/or traffic effects in the area by: adding, on the basis of the predicted environmental effects and traffic effects, a surcharge to the price of transportation offers, depending upon any undesired environmental and/or traffic effects of the respective transportation offer, and - controlling the traffic interventions, in dependence upon the predicted environmental effects and traffic effects of the granted transportation requests.

12. The method according to claim 11, wherein any undesired effects of all granted transportation requests in the area (A) are limited to a maximum value.

13. The method according to claim 11 or 12, wherein the traffic interventions are specific for a granted transportation request.

14. The method according to claim 11, 12 or 13, further comprising the step of determining surcharges and traffic interventions in dependence upon the predicted effects of the transportation

15. A computer program product for carrying out the method according to any of claims 11-14.