Enhancing the computation of barrier-free routes via crowdsourcing

Navigation systems rely on a large amount of geodata for their route computations. Depending on the used map material and application, this geodata includes barrier information, such as staircases or steep inclines, which is helpful for mobility impaired people when looking for a barrier-free route. On the basis of OpenStreetMap (OSM), which is included in the GraphHopper routing engine, we have developed the mobility app WheelScout, which computes barrier-free routes using the users’ individual mobility profile as well as barrier information which is extracted from OSM but also included by our users – both manually and automatically via data which the sensors in the mobile devices gather, i.e. via crowdsourcing. Using the example of inclines, we will demonstrate how we automatically compute the information of this barrier by gathering information on barometric altitude data and using those to compute the degree of the incline and therefore the barrier.