Overview

Welcome to the Digital Roads of the Future Initiative. The programme is leading the way in the digital revolution of our vital road network, a once-in-a-century transformation to make roads safer and greener. The initiative involves more than 50 researchers at Cambridge, working collaboratively with business. They will explore how digital twins, smart materials, data science and robotic monitoring can work together to develop a connected physical and digital road infrastructure system. The vision is to deliver resilient roads that can measure and monitor their own performance over time. The initiative is supported by two grants, Digital Roads, and Future Roads. They have a combined budget of £14.5m, and are both focused on expressways, a term used to describe dual carriageway trunk roads that are mostly grade separated. Combined, these programmes will build a critical mass of over 50 researchers at the University of Cambridge (UOC) over the next five years, working collaboratively with National Highways (NH), Costain (COS) and many other industry partners, to develop a connected physical and digital road infrastructure system. The research encompasses four key areas, (Digital Twins, Smart Materials, Data Science, Automation & Robotics and Sustainability) exploring how they can work together to develop a connected physical and digital road infrastructure system, while being underpinned by sustainability, to help reduce traffic, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and electrify the network.