Feasibility of a Testing Methodology for Visible Light Communication Systems Applied to Intelligent Transport Systems

This paper presents a methodology for testing and evaluation of Visible Light Communication (VLC) applications in the context of Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS). The methodology was applied in a test bed located in Sao Paulo - Brazil, which allows the evaluation of wireless communication technologies between vehicle and road infrastructure elements and between vehicles, even if traveling in high speed. The evaluated application refers to locating buses in real-time in urban places where the Global Positioning System technology is compromised due to loss of signal (sometimes for relatively long periods), such as tunnels and bus terminals. Through VLC, which uses modulated Light-emitting Diodes (LED) as data transmitters, it would be possible to overcome these drawbacks, taking advantage of the existing public lighting infrastructure as a means of transmission of positioning coordinates. The test results showed the feasibility of the proposed application and, most relevant, of the testing methodology. It opens up a range of VLC testing options related to the various ITS domains expressed in ISO 14813, such as vehicle-to-vehicle (e. g. warning signals in platooning scenarios) and vehicle-to-infrastructure-to-vehicle communication (e. g. half or fullduplex communication between vehicles and traffic signals in crossroads).