Road

A new cement-like material that could be used to form sidewalks, bike and jogging paths, driveways and parking lots, may be able to lessen two environmental problems, namely plastic waste and polluted rainwater runoff. The substance is called Plastisoil, and it was developed by Naji Khoury, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at Temple University in Philadelphia. In order to make Plastisoil, discarded polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic bottles are pulverized and mixed with soil, and then that mixture is blended with a coarse aggregate and heated. The result is a hard yet non-watertight substance, similar to pervious concrete or porous asphalt. Read More

Laying down paving bricks is back-breaking, time-consuming work... or at least, it is if you do it the usual way. Henk van Kuijk, director of Dutch industrial company Vanku, evidently decided that squatting/kneeling and shoving the bricks into place on the ground was just a little too slow, so he invented the Tiger Stone paving machine. The road-wide device is fed loose bricks, and lays them out onto the road as it slowly moves along. A quick going-over with a tamper, and you’ve got an instant brick road. Read More

It’s not unusual for automotive designers to test virtual models of cars on virtual models of bumpy roads. The model of the car, of course, represents an actual proposed vehicle. As for the road, however... where does that model come from? In the case of new technology used by Buick, it’s a millimeter-precise recreation of an existing, physical road. Read More

Last month, we told you about an experiment with air-purifying concrete that was recently conducted in the Netherlands. Researchers resurfaced 1,000 square meters of a busy road with concrete paving stones that contained titanium dioxide (TiO2), a photocatalytic material that removes automobile-produced nitrogen oxides (NOx) from the air and converts them into nitrate with the aid of sunlight. When the air was tested up to one-and-a-half meters above those stones, NOx levels were found to be 25 to 45 percent lower than above regular concrete on the same road. Now, a similar study is underway in Germany, and is already showing promising results. Read More

Luckily there aren’t many countries that drive on the opposite side of the road and share borders. However, they do exist, such as China, which drives on the right, and the former British colony of Hong Kong, and former Portuguese colony of Macau, both which drive on the left. This can pose an interesting problem for engineers and road planners, but Dutch architectural firm, NL Architects, has come up with a bridge with a twist – a concept that not only puts the drivers on the correct side of the road physically, but helps reinforce that fact visually to help get the drivers into the mindset of driving on the opposite side of the road. Read More

More and more cars are integrating driver assistance features that help do things like avoid collisions, keep a safe distance from other vehicles, or even parallel park. There are also Lane Departure Warning systems that use onboard cameras to keep the driver from drifting out of their lane. But what happens if the roadside markings are worn away, or covered with snow or mud? Norwegian research organization SINTEF has come up with a solution called WayPilot – a system which uses sensors embedded in the asphalt and a shaking steering wheel to alert drivers before they stray too far off course. Read More

What’s more frustrating than an accident with a fellow motorist? Trying to work out who is at fault. Aiming to do away with such disagreements and improve overall driver security is the Kolimat Roadscan DTW 1.0 Camera system. Equipped with a dual lens in-car camera that records up to 12 hours of audio and video onto an SD card, the unit also takes still pictures at regular intervals and features full GPS and Wi-Fi capabilities. But with a function that disables erasing of data for events that measure above a preset “G” force, you had better hope you’re not at fault… Read More

Like most things, ice can be a blessing or a burden depending on the circumstances. It’s perfect crushed in a drink on a hot summer’s day, but can wreak havoc when it collects on roads, power lines and aircraft in freezing temperatures. A University of Pittsburgh-led team has found a way to reduce these dangers by developing a nanoparticle-based coating that can be easily applied to impede the buildup of ice on solid surfaces. Read More

Taking driver-assist technology to the next level is the “Smart Stop” system currently in development by Mercedes Benz. The wireless safety system, which allows intersections to communicate with vehicles, would automatically cause a car to stop at a red light should a driver fail to heed it. Read More