Cellphone Accessible Information Via Bluetooth Beaconing for the Visually Impaired

This paper describes a complete hardware/software system, dubbed Universal Real-Time Navigational Assistance (URNA), which enables communication of relevant location-aware information to a blind person carrying a Bluetooth enabled cell phone. Although URNA can be used for a number of different applications e.g., an information kiosk at a shopping mall or public transit information at a bus stop, the authors concentrate on the challenging case of an urban intersection. Information provided to the user as he or she approaches the intersection includes a description of the intersection topology and real-time notification of the state of the traffic lights.