Patent ID: 8676483

Claim:
A guidance control device installed in a vehicle capable of automatic shift control of an automatic transmission, the guidance control device comprising: a controller configured to: access vehicle state information that specifies a state of the vehicle, the vehicle state information being usable to determine whether the vehicle is being decelerated while traveling downhill; determine whether the vehicle is being decelerated while traveling downhill based on the accessed vehicle state information; access driving environment information that specifies a driving environment of the vehicle, the driving environment information being usable to determine whether the vehicle should be decelerated by executing the automatic shift control; determine whether the vehicle should be decelerated based on the accessed driving environment information; specify an actual fuel consumption of the vehicle for a particular travel segment; when it is determined that the vehicle (1) is not being decelerated while traveling downhill and (2) should be decelerated by executing the automatic shift control: perform automatic shift control; and generate guidance indicating that the automatic shift control is being performed because it has been determined that the vehicle should be decelerated; and when (1) the shift control is not being performed, and (2) it is determined that the vehicle should be decelerated by executing the automatic shift control for the particular road segment: estimate a first tentative fuel consumption of the vehicle under the assumption that the shift control was performed in the particular travel segment; and generate guidance indicating the specified actual fuel consumption and the estimated first tentative fuel consumption; and cause the generated guidance to be output on a display.