Skip to main content

High-viz' potholes innovation

Two Milan Polytechnic students, Domenico Diego and Cristina Corradini have designed the ‘Street Safe Initiative’, comprising a brightly coloured layer of asphalt a few centimetres beneath the surface of the road, which becomes visible when the road surface breaks up, making potholes easier to see and avoid.
February 2, 2012 Read time: 1 min
Two 578 Milan Polytechnic students, Domenico Diego and Cristina Corradini have designed the ‘Street Safe Initiative’, comprising a brightly coloured layer of asphalt a few centimetres beneath the surface of the road, which becomes visible when the road surface breaks up, making potholes easier to see and avoid.

The unique design will be trialled later this year in Rho, a small town close to Milan, to determine if the project is viable and cost-effective.

“We have compared the road surface to the human skin: when we are wounded, we start to bleed,” says Diego.

“So our idea is to put a layer of yellow asphalt beneath the tarmac, which appears and creates a high chromatic contrast that is visible from a distance. This way, the potholes are signalled as they appear and road users have enough time to react safely.”

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Terrestrial solution to stellar shortcomings
    December 5, 2013
    Inherent weaknesses in satellite communications are leading several countries to re-evaluate terrestrial-based backup systems. There is a tale frequently told in satellite navigation circles, of how landing systems at Newark Airport were disrupted by a truck driver using GPS jamming equipment as he drove along the New Jersey Turnpike. While there was no threat to flight safety as the interference to GPS reference stations being tested, the story highlights how apparently benign threats have the potential t
  • change in the US transportation sector
    February 1, 2012
    Transportation for America's James Corless talks about the changes needed in the US's transportation policy. Anew report, 'Smart Mobility for a 21st Century America', highlights how improving efficiency through technology is critical as the US's population grows and ages, budgets tighten and consumer preferences shift.
  • change in the US transportation sector
    February 6, 2012
    Transportation for America's James Corless talks about the changes needed in the US's transportation policy. Anew report, 'Smart Mobility for a 21st Century America', highlights how improving efficiency through technology is critical as the US's population grows and ages, budgets tighten and consumer preferences shift.
  • Communication: the future of machine vision
    May 30, 2013
    Jason Barnes asks leading machine vision industry figures what they consider to be the educational barriers to the technology’s increased uptake by the ITS sector. The recent rush by some organisations within the ITS sector to associate themselves with the term ‘machine vision’ underlines just how important the technology has become in a relatively short space of time. However, despite the technology having been applied in certain traffic management applications for some years, there remains a significant s