Researchers at Aston University in the UK have teamed up with a traffic engineering consultancy to develop technology to capture information on road conditions.

The goal is to improve roads, resulting in reduced emissions and fewer accidents, as well as saving money for local government.

The research team and Smart Transport Hub will work together in a knowledge transfer partnership (KTP) to capture highway asset information and road conditions using hardware integrated with machine vision and machine learning to analyse camera feeds in real time and relay information to highway contractors.

KTPs, funded by Innovate UK (www.ukri.org/councils/innovate-uk), are collaborations between a business, a university and a qualified research associate. The UK-wide programme helps businesses to improve their competitiveness and productivity through the better use of knowledge, technology and skills. Aston University is a KTP provider, ranked first for project quality and joint first for the volume of active projects.

This technology should improve road network conditions and traffic management, enhance highway maintenance operations by enabling timely repairs, and increase productivity while reducing costs through automated surveys over larger geographic areas instead of manual site-specific surveys. It should also lead to better traffic conditions and improved health and safety, resulting in fewer accidents, as well as reduced emissions and lower pollution levels.

By combining academic and industry expertise, the KTP aims to create world-first mobile technology for real-time traffic monitoring that can function in busy city environments and in all weather conditions.

“Aston University is right at the forefront of research in AI and deep learning for traffic simulation,” said Nicola Mastini, principal consultant at Smart Transport Hub (www.smartransport.co.uk). “The KTP gives us a unique opportunity to integrate some of that knowledge and use this as a basis for upscaling our team, boosting our productivity and developing a very unique and attractive commercial product.”

Maria Chli, reader in applied AI and robotics at Aston University, added: “Developing a smart mobile traffic monitoring and management system that harvests data from multiple vehicles and updates our traffic simulator is going to require a lot of innovation. We have the expertise to share with Smart Transport Hub, and together with their unique data-driven approach, I’m excited about the benefits we can bring to the transport sector.”

Aston University (www.aston.ac.uk) has a reputation for developing AI that is directly applicable to addressing smart cities’ challenges. The KTP project’s academic team is a specialist in traffic signal control using AI, and works at the forefront of AI-driven, accurate traffic simulation and traffic actor modelling. The team will draw heavily on the Aston simulation model, Traffic 3D, to deliver the project using its broader capabilities in machine learning, deep reinforcement learning, object detection and action recognition.

For more information on the KTP visit www.aston.ac.uk/business/collaborate-with-us/knowledge-transfer-partnership/at-work/smart-traffic-sensors.