Raspberry- Pi (On-board computer) based Intelligent

Vehicle Parking System

Faiza Amjad, Ayesha Haroon, Moiz Hayat
Department of Electrical Engineering
Comsats Institute Of Information Technology, Islamabad

Abstract-- Parallel and reverse Car Parking is complex Job

especially for the beginners as well as intermediate due to Raspberry pi has a total of 26 pins out of which 10 GPIO pins
can be used to connect sensors and motors whereas 2nd and 6th
the presence of the blind spots. An automated parking
pins can be used as Vcc and ground respectively.
assistant system is required to make the driver aware of any
static/dynamic obstacle and visibility of those blind spots.
To overcome this issue we are planning to construct a
digital system that uses Raspberry-Pi an on-board
computer which will be interfaced with cameras to visualize
the blind spots and proximity sensors for obstacle detection.
The prototype of the system will be implemented on a toy
car.

I. INTRODUCTION

Raspberry pi is a pocket sized microprocessor based on-board

computer with a Linux operating system which provides user
all the qualities of a normal desktop computer. Raspberry-pi is
Fig.2 pi pin configuration
now being tremendously used for various applications such as
home automation, robot, parking systems etc. It’s all in one
feature distinct it from other on-board computers. Other than
Ultrasonic sensor:
USB ports raspberry –pi has Ethernet port and some general
Ultrasound reflection is used to measure the object proximity
input output pins that provides users with a capability to
or range in an ultrasonic sensor. HC-SR04 is a good choice
connect and program almost all sensors and gadgets available.
because it has stable performance and provides high ranging
Here in our project we have used multiple sonars (proximity
accuracy. It has various applications in Robotics, Vehicle
sensors) connected with GPIO pins that are intelligently
parking, Public security etc. There are one or more transmitters,
programmed so as to calculate the distance or to detect the
control circuits and a receiver in an ultrasonic sensor. A high
obstacles. Analyzing this data raspberry –pi controls the H-
frequency ultrasonic sound is emitted by the transmitter which
bridge and drives the motors accordingly to park the car.
falls on any nearby object. Some of the waves are dispersed
External memory (SD cards) is used with raspberry pi. In order
while some others reflect back. The signal returned is processed
to use the pi Noobs and Raspbian is installed in the SD card.
by the control circuit. This is how the distance between the
DHCP server is used along with Xming and PUTTY to access
sensor and the object is measured. We used HC-SR04
the pi. Power is supplied to the pi through micro USB power
ultrasonic sensor with raspberry pie to find the distance
port. There are five LEDs near the USB connector showing the
between the car and the object. It has four pins i.e. ground
status of raspberry pi as ACT shows the SD card activity, PWR
(GND), echo pulse output (ECHO), trigger pulse input (TRIG)
for power, FDX shows full duplex Ethernet connection.
and 5V supply Vcc. The module is grounded by using GND
Fig.1 shows the architecture of raspberry pi.
and power is supplied using Vcc. The raspberry pie sends an
input pulse to TRIG and ECHO will be zero volts until the
sensor is triggered. The return pulse sets ECHO to 5V for
complete pulse duration. The pulse duration is actually the time
between the receivers detecting the pulse and the sensor
providing the output pulse. Therefore for calculating the
distance, we must measure the pulse duration first.

Fig.1 raspberry-pi architecture Fig.3 HC-SR04

Faiza Amjad | Introduction 27

DC Motors:
We used DC motors to drive and turn the car. The basic
principle of the DC motor is that the conductor experiences
torque and mechanical motion in the presence of magnetic field.
The direction of rotation is proportional to the direction of
current as when the current is reversed, the direction of rotation
would also be reversed. The speed of the motor is proportional
to the force.
II. Existing Model

Work in this field is being preferred by most of the automobile

companies like TOYOTA, BMW using different micro
controllers and sensors such as AUDRINO and INFRARED
technology respectively. Because of the huge importance of
automatic car parking many people are working on this field.
Jung-Ho Moon, Tae Kwon Ha(2013) has worked on car
parking monitoring system using wireless sensor networks. Fig.4 Block Diagram
RamneetKaur and Balwinder Singh (2013) described how the
design and implementation of car parking system can be done
through FPGA.Soh Chun Khang et.al, (2010) presents a
parking system in which driver comes to know about the space
availability in the parking lot with the help of SMS
service.Tsung-hua Hsu, Jing-Fu Liu, Pen-Ning Yu, Wang-
Shuan Lee and Jia-Sing Hsu developed an automatic parking
system for vehicles with the help of position estimation and
tracking algorithms. Mala
Aggarwal,SimmiAggarwal ,R.S.Uppal(2012) introduced the
comparative implementation of automatic car parking system
with least distance parking space in wireless sensor networks.

III. PROPOSED MODEL

In our project we have used raspberry pi instead of AUDRINO

as a micro controller and sonars instead of infrared sensors.
Other than that we have used cameras to cover the blind spots
which will certainly acknowledge the driver about the obstacles.
We used PYTHON language for controlling the sensors. The
distance provided by the sensors is then used by the DC motors
to drive the car accordingly. For achieving accuracy in parking
we have used four sensors along with two DC motors; one for
rear wheels and other for front wheels.
The block diagram shows how sensors, camera and dc motors
connected with raspberry pi are attached to a toy car.L298n H-
bridge is used as a motor driver for 2 dc motors.
First we setup all the GPIO pins to be used as high. Next step is
to set up all the 4 sonars for the detection of the nearby objects.
The sonar near the obstacle will give smaller distance. For this
Fig.5 parallel parking scenario
particular parallel parking scenario, based on the distance of the
side and back sonars the motor will rotate the car accordingly Fig.5 shows the senario we have worked on. Parallel parking is
like left, right, forward or reverse. The camera will show the a tough job which can be accomplished step by step.
back view and will locate all the blind spots. Speed of the
motors should be adjusted accordingly. Software Implementation:

Faiza Amjad | Existing Model 28


Fig.6 General flow chart for parallel parking
Fig.7 prototype (toy car)
Fig.7 shows the prototype on which our project is
implemented. This is just an example of how the sonar will
be attached to the car on the sides.
IV. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
Our parallel parking system has limitations as it can only be
used for few scenarios. However this system was implemented
to give an overview of how one can use raspberry –pi for the
implementation of parallel parking system. The system can be
improved by using more sonars for precise parking and using
stepper motor for precise rotation of wheels. Also we are using
limited number of sonars because of the limited number of
GPIO pins of raspberry pi model B. There is variation in speed
of dc motors therefore parking could not be so perfect.
V. CONCLUSIONS
In this paper we have described how parallel parking could be
done through raspberry pi using few sonars (proximity sensors)
and a camera. We preferred this method because it is not only
easy to implement but is economical as well. Sonars do not
provide us with exact distance. However the error is just a few
decimal places which is negligible. Raspberry-pi is a good
option as it provides us with an exceptional programming
platform.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We are obliged to our supervisor Mr. Irfanullah for guiding us
throughout the project. We would like to thank Comsats
Institute Of Information Technology, Islamabad for providing
funds for the project.
REFERENCES
[1] David T. Wilson, John E. Wreede, John E. Gunther, James
A. Arns, “vehicle parking alignment system”
[2] Jung-Ho Moon, Tae Kwon Ha, “A Car Parking Monitoring
System Using Wireless Sensor Networks”
[3] Fairus M.A, Sy. NajibSy. Salim, Irma WaniJamaludin, M.
NizamKamarudin, “Development of an Automatic Parallel
ParkingSystem for Nonholonomic Mobile Robot”
[4] Narayan Pandharinath Pawar, Minakshee M.Patil,
“Intelligent Driver Assistant System for Automotive”,
Volume:03, Issue: May 5, 2014
[5] Jae Il Roh, Hyunsuk Lee, Woojin Chung,” Control of a Car
with a Trailer using the Driver Assistance System”,
International Conference on Robotics and
Biomimetics,IEEE2011.
[6] S. Kneip, Furgale, “Using multi-camera systems in
robotics: Efficient solutions to the npnp problem,” 2013, iEEE
Conference on Robotics and Automation 2013 Conference.
[7] C. Urmson and W. Whittaker, “Self-driving cars and the
urban challenge,” Intelligent Systems, IEEE, vol. 23, no. 2, pp.
66–68, 2008.
[8] M. M. Rashid, A. Musa, M. Ataur Rahman, and N.
Farahana, A. Farhana, “Automatic Parking Management
System and Parking Fee Collection Based on Number Plate
Recognition”, International Journal of Machine Learning and
Computing, Vol. 2, No. 2, April 2012
Faiza Amjad | Existing Model 29