Creating transport protocol experts group frames

1. A method of generating a traffic information frame for selected roads within a broadcast area, the method comprises:

receiving traffic information from a traffic data source;

obtaining road vector definitions for one or more roads identified in the traffic information;

associating the road vector definitions with longitude and latitude to link the traffic information to particular roads;

creating a Transport Protocol Experts Group (TPEG) traffic message, including the traffic information and the one or more roads associated with the traffic information;

performing a check to determine if there are additional road vectors to be associated with the traffic information for a particular traffic incident; and

caching the TPEG traffic message when there are no additional road vectors to be associated with the traffic information for a particular traffic incident;

obtaining bounding area definitions of bounding areas associated with the particular traffic incident;

combining cached TPEG messages into a composite TPEG frame using the bounding area definitions; and

broadcasting the TPEG frame to at least a primary bounding area based on the bounding area definitions.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the traffic information includes any of: incident location, traffic flow information, traffic speed, incident information, accidents, stalls, clearing of accidents, accident severity, road closures, construction information, or suggested alternate routes.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the traffic message includes any of: traffic incident data, an incident identifier, a starting and ending latitude and longitude of an incident, a start time, end time, a last modified time, an incident type, an incident severity, a road-closure indicator, a verification indicator, lane information, or congestion information.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the incident identifier includes a unique identifier including any of: a numerical identifier or an alphanumerical identifier, used to distinguish one traffic incident from another.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein a first traffic incident is assigned a first incident number and a second traffic incident is assigned a second incident number.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the road vector definitions are obtained for a plurality of roads in a particular broadcast area in advance, and stored in a road vector database for future use.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the road vector definitions include any of: road classification data or road longitude and latitude coordinates.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the bounding area definitions include information associating various road classes, or classifications, with primary bounding areas and sub-bounding areas.

9. The method of claim 8 further comprises generating an updated individual TPEG traffic message at a refresh rate determined, at least in part, on road classifications of a road with which the updated individual TPEG traffic message is associated.

10. The method of claim 8 , wherein the bounding area definitions include locational definitions that define boundary edges, and road classification information indicating which road classes are associated for inclusion in, or exclusion from, one or more particular bounding areas.

11. The method of claim 1 further comprises creating the TPEG traffic message for one or more time blocks for each piece of traffic information.

12. The method of claim 1 further comprises, for additional roads, updating the TPEG traffic message to include information linking the additional roads to the traffic information.

13. The method of claim 1 further comprises creating the TPEG traffic message on a per-road vector basis rather than on a per-traffic incident or item basis.

14. The method of claim 1 , wherein a single TPEG traffic message is generated per road vector.

15. The method of claim 1 , wherein a traffic incident that involves multiple roads is expressed as multiple TPEG traffic messages, with one of the TPEG traffic messages being associated with each road vector.

16. The method of claim 1 , wherein a traffic incident that involves multiple roads is expressed as a result in a single TPEG traffic message associated with multiple roads.

17. The method of claim 1 , wherein the TPEG frame generated is transmitted for broadcast by transmitting the TPEG frame to a station importer, via file transfer protocol (FTP), with subsequent insertion into an high definition (HD) radio broadcast.

18. A system comprising:

a processor;

a memory coupled to the processor;

the processor configured to:

receive traffic information from a traffic data source;

obtain road vector definitions for one or more roads identified in the traffic information;

associate the road vector definitions with longitude and latitude to link the traffic information to particular roads;

create a Transport Protocol Experts Group (TPEG) traffic message, including the traffic information and the one or more roads associated with the traffic information;

perform a check to determine if there are additional road vectors to be associated with the traffic information for a particular traffic incident; and

cache the TPEG traffic message when there are no additional road vectors to be associated with the traffic information for a particular traffic incident;

obtain bounding area definitions of bounding areas around the particular traffic incident;

combine cached TPEG traffic messages into a composite TPEG traffic frame using the bounding area definitions; and

configure the TPEG traffic message into TPEG traffic frames for broadcast to at least a primary bounding area based on the bounding area definitions.

19. The system of claim 18 , wherein the bounding area definitions include information associating various road classes, or classifications, with the primary bounding area and associated sub-bounding area.

20. The system of claim 19 , wherein the processor is further configured to generate an updated individual TPEG traffic message at a refresh rate determined, at least in part, on road classifications of a road with which the updated individual TPEG traffic message is associated.