Pothole-free future in sight, thanks to new digital transformation road project
07 February 2024
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A £17 million project carried out by Cambridge engineers aims to create self-healing roads.
In the BBC Breakfast interview broadcast on Monday 15 January (National Pothole Day), the Digital Roads research team demonstrated how digital twins (virtual replicas) and data science can be used to determine early intervention of road damage, while smart materials and robotic monitoring can be useful for repair strategies.
The University of Cambridge is working with industry partners National Highways and Costain on this once-in-a-century transformation to enable safer and greener road networks that are resilient and can measure and monitor their own performance over time.
Potholes form a significant threat to the safety of cyclists and drivers. Fixing a pothole is costly for local and national road authorities, involving large amounts of material, work hours and road closures.
When small cracks form on the surface of a road, water can then penetrate the road, which, when combined with extreme cold weather, can lead to further damage to the road surface, with the water turning to ice, thus expanding the cracks. This action, repeated over and over, can lead to the formation of damaging potholes.
Digital Roads proposes a way of detecting cracks that form on the surface of a road, monitoring their condition and assessing the most effective way to repair damage in a timely and safe manner. All while using materials that are both good for the environment, sustainable and which can be applied to the road efficiently.
Speaking to the BBC, Dr Damian Palin, Senior Research Associate in Smart Materials, said research is underway looking at materials to build resilience into the structure of roads.
“We are trying to enhance these materials through their environmental impact or performance by adding things like fibres and trying to make them self-heal. The aim is to eventually have no potholes, but a road can heal itself,” he said.