Hyperbolic Vehicle Localization Using a Single Signal of Opportunity and Trajectory Constraints

Abstract

This paper proposes a new vehicle localization method using signals of opportunity (SoO) from a single source. The method is based on the time difference of arrival (TDoA) of a SoO, transmitted by a base station (BS) and received by two antennas on the vehicle. To measure the TDoA the vehicle antennas are connected to synchronized receivers. For localization it is further assumed that the baseline between the vehicle antennas is known or at least measurable. However, a single TDoA measurement is not sufficient for estimating the vehicle location. Therefore, prior information about constraints on the vehicle trajectory, such as roads or railway tracks, is incorporated in the estimation. The feasibility of the proposed method is shown by deriving the positioning Cramer-Rao lower bound (CRLB) for road and railway vehicles. Based on the CRLB the achievable localization accuracy is evaluated in a simulation study. In the evaluation the effect of different geometries between the receivers and the BS is analyzed and the relevant parameters with respect to the achievable localization accuracy are identified.