Patent Issued for Accident Prone Location Notification System And Method (USPTO 10,490,080)

2019 DEC 11 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Alexandria, Virginia, NewsRx journalists report that a patent by the inventor Kerr, Ronald Stewart (Dublin, OH), filed on March 20, 2018, was published online on December 9, 2019.

The patent’s assignee for patent number 10,490,080 is Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company (Columbus, Ohio, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Field of the Invention

“The present invention relates to a system and method for identifying accident-prone locations, and more particularly to a system and method for identifying accident prone-locations to be displayed on a graphical user interface or to be used to notify consumers.

“Discussion of the Related Art

“Various types of mapping software and systems exist that provide maps and driving directions over communications networks, such as the Internet. However, these systems and software do not identify accident hot spots (i.e., accident-prone locations). Further, these systems and software do not notify users of the locations of such accident-prone locations.

“Thus, there remains a need for a system and method for notifying users, particularly drivers, of accident-prone locations.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventor’s summary information for this patent: “Accordingly, the present invention is directed to a method and system for accident-prone location notification that substantially obviates one or more problems due to limitations and disadvantages of the related art.

“An object of the present invention is to provide a system and method for making notifications of accident-prone locations.

“Another object of the present invention is to provide a system and method for encouraging cautious or defensive driving, thus decreasing the number and/or severity of vehicle accidents.

“And yet a further object of the present invention is to decrease the number and/or severity of insurance claims through the notification of accident-prone locations.

“Additional features and advantages of the invention will be set forth in the description which follows, and in part will be apparent from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The objectives and other advantages of the invention will be realized and attained by the structure particularly pointed out in the written description and claims hereof as well as the appended drawings.

“To achieve these and other advantages and in accordance with the purpose of the present invention, as embodied and broadly described, the method includes maintaining vehicle accident occurrence information. The accident occurrence information includes accident location information. Based at least in part on the accident location information, one or more accident-prone locations are identified. When a vehicle enters an area that includes one of the accident-prone locations, a notification is made that the vehicle has entered such an area.

“In another aspect, the system includes a database that maintains vehicle accident occurrence information that includes accident location information; a processor that identifies one or more accident-prone locations based, at least in part, on the accident location information; and a delivery component comprising a global positioning system that notifies a driver that the driver has entered an area that includes an accident-prone area when the driver enters such an area.

“In yet another aspect, the method includes maintaining vehicle accident occurrence information, wherein the vehicle accident occurrence information comprises accident location information, accident occurrence date information, and accident occurrence time information.

“Based at least in part on the accident location information, one or more accident-prone locations are identified. In response to a query, a visual representation of one of the accident-prone locations is displayed, along with accident occurrence date information and accident occurrence time information associated with the accident-prone location.

“In another aspect, the accident hot spot notification system includes a database that maintains vehicle accident occurrence information, wherein the vehicle accident occurrence information comprises accident location information, accident occurrence date information, and accident occurrence time information; a processor that identifies one or more accident-prone locations based, at least in part, on the accident location information; and a display component that displays, in response to a query, a visual representation of one of the accident-prone locations, along with accident occurrence date information and accident occurrence time information associated with the accident-prone location.

“It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory and are intended to provide further explanation of the invention as claimed.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“What is claimed is:

“1. A method comprising: maintaining vehicle accident occurrence information, wherein the vehicle accident occurrence information comprises information describing accidents including accident location information; identifying, based at least in part on the accident location information, one or more accident-prone locations; and in response to a user-initiated query, the query comprising a request to identify accident prone locations, displaying on a display component a visual representation of one or more of the accident-prone locations, wherein the visual representation is displayed by way of an indicator superimposed on a map and is configured to indicate visually both a frequency and a severity of accidents previously occurring at the accident-prone locations, and wherein at least some of the vehicle accident occurrence information associated with the one or more accident-prone locations is displayed upon selecting the indicator.

“2. A system comprising: a database that maintains vehicle accident occurrence information, wherein the vehicle accident occurrence information comprises information describing accidents including accident location information; a processor that identifies one or more accident-prone locations based, at least in part, on the accident location information; and a display component that displays, in response to a user-initiated query, the query comprising a request to identify accident-prone locations, a visual representation of one or more of the accident-prone locations, wherein the visual representation is displayed by way of an indicator superimposed on a map and is configured to indicate visually both a frequency and a severity of accidents previously occurring at the accident-prone locations, and wherein at least some of the vehicle accident occurrence information associated with the one or more accident-prone locations is displayed upon selecting the indicator.

“3. The method claim 2, further comprising: in response to a user-initiated navigation query, providing directions based on avoiding accident-prone locations that have the frequency above a frequency threshold and the severity above a severity threshold.”

For additional information on this patent, see: Kerr, Ronald Stewart. Accident Prone Location Notification System And Method. U.S. Patent Number 10,490,080, filed March 20, 2018, and published online on December 9, 2019. Patent URL: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=10,490,080.PN.&OS=PN/10,490,080RS=PN/10,490,080

(Our reports deliver fact-based news of research and discoveries from around the world.)