Use of smartphone accelerometers for winter road maintenance improvement in urban areas

Abstract

The objective of the winter maintenance is to maintain transport links and enable everyday life to continue during adverse weather conditions. In urban areas in northern regions, especially with large population and numerous streets the topic to increase efficiency is an important agenda for local authorities. The issues of safety, environmental and health impacts, street availability and minimum delays to the travelling public on the treated network need to be addressed and improvement measures to be taken. This paper investigates an application of participatory mobile sensing with smartphone tri-axial accelerometers: detecting and reporting the surface conditions of roads. The proposed solution is an elaboration of mobile pothole detection using sensor networks for road surface condition monitoring when snow and ice occurs. © 2013 WIT Press.