Route guidance systems: Review and classification

The term intelligent transportation systems (ITS) is generally used to refer to infrastructure and services, as well as the planning, operation, and control methods to optimize transportation and to increase the safety of transportation. U.S. Department of Transportation categorized the ITS to eight main categories including travel and transportation management, public transportation operations, electronic toll payment, commercial vehicle operations, emergency management, advanced vehicle control and safety systems, information management and, maintenance and construction management. Route guidance systems are one of the main components of travel and transportation management. Although route guidance systems will play an important role in future transportation, few reviews have been presented on them. In this article, we are going to review the main architectures which have been proposed so far, compare them and categorize them based on their structures and communications. This could be useful to find out the future trend of this technology and work on next issues in the field.