Three winning ideas are to be trialled with National Highways which will use the latest technology to help ease the pain of roadworks for drivers, businesses and local communities.
National Highways launched its innovation competition to find new ways to improve people’s experiences of roadworks. Earlier this year, 10 finalists received up to £15,000 each to investigate the feasibility of their ideas.
Three of those solutions have now been selected to be trialled in real-life situations on England’s motorways and A-roads network and will each receive up to £60,000 to take their ideas forward.
The three winners are:
- Cambridge-based Alchera Technologies which will use AI to improve roadwork planning by better understanding the impacts of different roadworks and road closures ensuring the best option for road users and reduced delays. They will be working with Costain.
- Robok, also based in Cambridge, will use AI-powered computer vision technology to analyse CCTV footage offering a better understanding of both road user and roadworker behaviour and helping to improve people’s experiences of roadworks. This trial will be supported by Balfour Beatty.
- WordNerds, of Gateshead, will provide new insights on people’s perception of roadworks using AI powered text-analytics which will help National Highways make evidence-based improvements on planned works. Kier and Costain are supporting this trial.
Working in collaboration with Connected Places Catapult, National Highways launched the competition in a bid to find new or existing technology, products or solutions that can make a positive difference to people’s experience of roadworks.
One of the goals of the competition was to allow smaller enterprises, which haven’t traditionally had the opportunity to work directly with National Highways and its supply chain, to showcase their ideas and win the chance to take it out on the road network.
National Highways Executive Director for Major Projects, Nicola Bell, said:
“Our goal in launching the competition was to find new ideas to help reduce the impact of roadworks on people and we are confident these exciting projects will be able to do just that.
“We are putting them to the test on our network which will be the real challenge but we are excited to see how well they perform and the difference they can make not only to road users but people living near ongoing works.
“Roadworks are frustrating but they are an essential part of managing our roads so anything we can do to ease the impact of these vital works is to be welcomed.”
The three trials will get under way in January. As well as the funding to develop their projects, the winning ideas also get technical and commercial support from experts at Connected Places Catapult and at National Highways to help develop and scale up their innovations.
The competition is funded through National Highways’ Designated Funds. This is ring-fenced funding dedicated to investing in and supporting initiatives that deliver lasting benefits for road users, the environment and communities across England.
Alchera Technologies co-founder and CEO, Anna Jordan, said:
“Alchera already works with major highways customers. It was a natural progression to seek a relationship with the biggest customer in our home market, National Highways. The competition provided us with that opportunity. The trial enables us to proof our technology in day-to-day operations, demonstrate the value to National Highways, seeking to establish a business-as-usual relationship at conclusion.”
Robok co-founder and CEO, Hao Zheng, said:
“We are excited to team up with National Highways and Balfour Beatty utilising CCTV cameras at roadworks to improve road user experiences. This project has the potential to unlock rich information to drive informed decisions, benefiting drivers, workers and the wider community as a whole.”
Innovation Manager at Wordnerds, Ruth Erdal, said:
“Wordnerds is focused on helping large organisations understand and act on their customer feedback, and it’s been so energising to see National Highway’s vision – of keeping the customer at the centre of everything they do. Having worked closely with National Highways and Costain in the feasibility phase, we are very excited to be undertaking a live trial with both organisations, plus Kier, in 2024. Together we will demonstrate how AI can improve the way the sector deals with feedback, and ultimately impact the way we all experience roadworks.”
