State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Assigned Patent for Using Train Telematics Data to Provide Information

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Dec. 14 -- State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance, Bloomington, Illinois, has been assigned a patent (9,841,287) developed by Gregory Hayward, Bloomington, Illinois, for "using train telematics data to provide information in one or more vehicles to reduce accident risk." The abstract states: "A computer system configured to use train telematics data to reduce risk of accidents via a mobile device traveling within a vehicle may be provided. The mobile device may be configured to (1) receive train telematics data associated with a train that includes GPS location, speed, route, heading, acceleration, and/or track data, (2) determine when, or a time period of when, the train will pass through, be passing through, or be within a predetermined distance of a railroad crossing based upon the train telematics data, (3) determine an alternate route for the vehicle to take to avoid waiting at the railroad crossing, and (4) cause display of the alternate route on a display of the mobile device or a vehicle navigation system to allow the train to pass and to avoid train-vehicle collisions. Insurance discounts may be generated based upon the risk mitigation or prevention functionality."

The patent application was filed on Jan. 7, 2016 (14/990,165). The full-text of the patent can be found at 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=9,841,287.PN.&OS=PN/9,841,287&RS=PN/9,841,287

Written by Deviprasad Jena; edited by Sudarshan Harpal.