Future of Transport: Street-Smarts

The rapid transformation of the car from slow and unreliable to brainiac life-saver is a story straight from Hollywood. Meanwhile, the roads we all drive on have evolved very little, comparatively speaking. But that is slowly changing as forward thinkers ranging from artists to governments are working out how to inject some street-smarts into the Tarmac and its surroundings. Here we discover some of the more interesting innovations heading our way.

Road paint that tells a story
Radical artists in the Netherlands have come up with a special reactive paint that impressed a local roads contractor so much it’s being tested right now for a launch later this year. Studio Roosegaarde’s paint is actually a photo-luminising powder with a range of uses, such as a glow-in-the-dark coating with 10 hours of luminosity that can be used to pick out the lanes in places without street lights.
In another form, the paint can react to freezing temperatures to warn motorists by revealing pictures of ice crystals in the road. And if that wasn’t enough, another method using the same technology, dubbed Dynamic Lines, can actually change elements of the lines from black to white, for example to create solid lines to stop vehicles lane-switching in heavy motorway traffic.
Wireless charging roads

Studio Roosegaarde

Wireless charging roads could help reduce the cost of manufacturing EVs

We’re already starting to use wireless charging for electric buses in places like Korea, Germany and Italy, but newer, smarter, charge-equipped roads are being envisaged for electric cars, too. The advantage this would have for electric cars is that they wouldn’t need a massive battery because less storage is required on the go, which would in turn help trim their cost. A special lane reserved exclusively for electric cars would also work a bit like the high occupancy vehicle lanes in the US – their lack of congestion giving car buyers another reason to go electric.

Culled from MSN News.