Classification of road conditions

Safe traffic conditions are essential for the transportations providing high logistic flow of goods for our industry. Service providers and authorities responsible for maintenance of roads in Sweden are interested in better technology for classification, surveillance and forecasting of road conditions.

Forecasting also means better planning of road maintenance activities. Our northern conditions with combinations of snow, ice and water on the road surface motivates research on sensor technology for detection of water, ice and snow. When this sensor data is combined with other metrology parameters such as humidity, temperature, wind, the condition of roads can be classified and also predicted in near future. Multiple band spectral imaging in the near infrared region is found to be promising for the detection of water in all phases. Imaging will provide information about how snow, ice and water are distributed on the road surface, e.g. wheel tracks on ice filled with water.