Improved Vehicle Positioning for Indoor Navigation in Parking Garages through Commercially Available Maps

We present a method that allows precise vehicle positioning inside buildings like parking garages. It works independently of GNSS and instead uses dead reckoning (DR) and a digital map of the parking garage. No additional hardware or infrastructure is needed, since the used inertial sensors and odometry are available in current premium series vehicles. Only additional map data for parking garages is required using existing format specifications. This data can be gathered with current technology available at map companies or from building plans. The position can be determined approximately to a single parking spot and be used for further indoor navigation on a mobile phone. Concerning this particular use case we have also implemented an interface for synchronization of location information between the mobile positioning solution and the car. When leaving the building navigation can start immediately to guide the user to the right exit.