By Mike Napolitano
Northeastern will lead a five-year project partially funded by the federal government to develop technology to assess the nation’s infrastructure without clearing roads and stopping traffic.
The Versatile Onboard Traffic Embedded Roaming Sensors (VOTERS) project, for which Northeastern was awarded a $9 million federal research grant, aims to develop new sensor systems that can be placed on the bottom of cars, trucks or buses and provide a real-time assessment of roads and bridges across the country.
Ming Wang, Ph.D., a professor of civil engineering and co-director of the project, said the goal is to create a system that will go with the flow of every day traffic.
“The goal is to create a cost effective and safe way to monitor our civil infrastructures, especially roadways and bridges under normal driving conditions,” he said.
Wang described the system as “some kind of instrument to be attached under your car, able to observe the surface and subsurface conditions of the roadway. The message will transmit to a center, compile information to address a maintenance issue with efficiency.”
The system will operate on computers installed in vehicles and will send streams of data back to base stations using a cellular phone system. Wang said the sensors are “acoustic listening device and systems complimented with a very sophisticated radar device.”
“We’re looking for potholes, cracks, corrosion and other abnormalities that are in need for repair,” he said.
Wang said the project team will aim to create a system that can be used on different types of vehicles.
“Instead of waiting for somebody to take a look by stopping traffic, [the system] could be used in a school bus, UPS truck or a regular government official car like a police car,” he said. “Information through many cars gathered become a statistically important mechanism to report the health of the roadways and bridges.”
The American Society of Civil Engineering (ASCE) 2005 Report Card, the latest report on the nation’s infrastructure from the organization, rates the United States a D. The report estimates $1.6 trillion is required to make basic repairs on the country’s roads, dams, bridges and other infrastructure.
Besides addressing the issue of needed repairs, Wang said the VOTERS system would have a number of other safety and environmental benefits. Stopped vehicles use more gas, he said, and amount to billions of dollars of waste. By not having to stop traffic and create highway work zones, Wang said the system will be safer.
“Every year there are several hundred [construction workers] being killed,” he said.
Overall, the construction industry experienced 1,178 deaths in 2007, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The project will be primarily headed by Northeastern researchers who will collaborate with a variety of institutions. The Massachusetts Highway Department, Analogic Corporation, Infrasense Inc. and researchers at Boston University, University of Massachusetts at Lowell and University of Vermont will contribute to the research, Wang said.
The project will cost $18.8 million in total, nine of which is from the federal government, with the rest of the money coming from individual joint venture companies and universities chipping in, Wang said.
President Joseph Aoun, said in a statement that one of Northeastern’s greatest strengths is working on projects that benefit society.
“We are pleased to take the lead on this important project, which will do a great deal toward improving our nation’s infrastructure and advancing public safety,” he said.
