When the first news came out of roads getting the illumination in the dark, many were overwhelmed with joy as even the thoughts of cruising along Tron-like roads was so fascinating. But soon after the initial test reports came out, the dreams were ruined, in many situations the roads’ radiance was not bright enough, it even failed when needed the most.
Despite of heart breaking initial results, the idea itself is nifty and at the Dutch Design Awards, it won the Best Future car Concept. This mind blowing concept uses a special paint on the lane and edges that is capable of absorbing ultraviolet light all day long and then glows in the dark. It is a brilliant step towards providing solution for energy crisis and will provide an energy-efficient substitute to the electric street lamps that are rather expensive to operate in rural areas. Unfortunately, the real-world performance of the paint was not satisfactory as the amount of light in the lanes was not uniform and under intense conditions like rain, they were even not visible.
The preliminary failure has not discouraged the engineering firm Heijmans Infrastructure rather they have started working on Glowing Lines 2.0, yet another test on roads due this summer. The company is very determined to have smart highway technology of multiple types. To save the energy, the company first planned motion-sensing road lamps and an adjustable road paint that would be capable of changing colour according to the weather conditions. They have even planned building special lanes encompassing wireless inductive charging. A single small step leads to a great breakthrough, once the illuminated roads get problem gets resolved, who knows what else the company has in it for us.
