Gm Global Technolgoy Operations, Inc.

Santhosh Kumar Narayanan

Marco T Carnevale

Mukesh Gupta

Sanjay Khunger

Joseph S Niemiec

A method of determining an attribute of a parking structure includes monitoring vehicle status data (VSD) obtained by a first on-board processor operatively associated with a vehicle telematics unit. The first processor executes computer readable code encoded on a first non-transitory computer readable medium. The method includes recording, in a vehicle memory operatively associated with the first processor, the VSD based on an output of a vehicle on-board sensor. The method further includes communicating the recorded VSD to a data aggregator of a remote parking information system (RPIS) for storage as aggregated data in a computer memory associated with the RPIS. The method determines, via the data aggregator, whether the vehicle is in the parking structure based on the communicated recorded VSD. The method further includes determining the attribute via the RPIS based on the VSD stored in the computer memory, and storing the attribute in the computer memory.

Method of determining an attribute of a parking structure

Implementations of the present invention contemplate utilizing the communicative connections between a telematics service provider (TSP), a communication device, and a telematics unit in a vehicle parked in a multilevel parking garage to determine location information of the vehicle and to provide such information to a subscriber of the TSP. A subscriber of a TSP may transmit a request for information pertaining to the location of a vehicle parked within a multilevel parking structure from a communication device. Upon the receipt of such a request, the TSP provides the information requested by the subscriber. In various implementations, the providing of such information by the TSP may involve querying the telematics unit in the vehicle or querying a database storing location information pertaining to one or more vehicles and may further involve performing calculations to derive the information requested by the communication device. In some implementations, the information requested by the communication device includes but is not limited to a floor number, or level, of the parking garage on which the telematics-equipped vehicle is parked.

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Troy, MI, United States of America

Santhosh Kumar Narayanan