Patent ID: 8068978

Claim:
A system for transporting inventory items, comprising: a route planning module operable to transmit a route response to a mobile drive unit, wherein the route response defines a path between a first point and a second point; a segment reservation module operable to: receive a reservation request from a mobile drive unit, the reservation request identifying a requested segment to be reserved; in response to receiving the reservation request, decide whether to reserve at least the requested segment for the requesting mobile drive unit; and transmit a reservation response to the reservation requesting mobile drive unit, wherein the reservation response indicates whether the requested segment has been reserved; and a mobile drive unit operable to: receive the route response defining the path, wherein: the path comprises an initial segment and one or more additional segments; the initial segment includes a portion of the path adjacent to the first point; and at least one of the additional segments includes a portion of the path adjacent to the second point; store the path; reserve the initial segment of the path; move away from the first point along the initial segment; after initiating movement along the initial segment, reserve each of the one or more additional segments of the path; move toward the second point along each segment while that segment is reserved.