A new £1m project to prepare motorways for self-driving vehicles has been launched by Loughborough University and Highways England.
The researchers will look at operations at roadworks, merging and diverging sections and lane markings to understand the challenges connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs) may face.
The project will evaluate whether CAVs can safely navigate through the existing configurations of construction zones.
The team will collect data about the flow and configuration of the traffic throughout different lane structures, junction layouts and stretches of roadworks via lidar, radars, cameras, GPS and other instruments.
Professor of Intelligent Transport Systems, Mohammed Quddus, said: 'To date there is significant investment and advancement in Connected and Autonomous Vehicles.
'It is, however, not known whether existing road infrastructure, which was designed for conventional vehicles, is ready for the safe and efficient operations of CAVs. CAVIAR directly addresses this challenge.'
