FHWA recentlyreleased Impacts of Automated Vehicles on Highway Infrastructure.
Connected and automated vehicle technologies have the potential to enhance highway safety by performing various driver functions and maintaining appropriate driver attention to traffic and roadway conditions. Such technologies can have a tremendous impact reducing roadway crashes (e.g., lane departure warning systems that alert the driver when the vehicle drifts past the lane markings).
As the vehicle fleet transitions to include a greater percentage of these vehicles, it is important to understand how the infrastructure and safety countermeasures need to adjust to accommodate the changes.
This project specifically covers the reported impacts of automated vehicles on highway infrastructure. The goal is to provide information to stakeholders as they prepare for the eventual infrastructure evolution driven by the deployment of automated vehicles.
This project does not delve into operations or provide policy recommendations, although infrastructure impacts outlined in this report are contingent upon policy and operations decisions. This report attempts to provide infrastructure owner-operators with a list of possible impacts of initial automated vehicle deployment on roadway infrastructure and identifies research opportunities based on feedback from State and local agencies and the automated vehicle industry.
For more information, contact Abdul Zineddin at abdul.zineddin@dot.gov.
