Smart Highway Construction Site Monitoring Using Artificial Intelligence

Construction is a large sector of the economy and plays a significant role in creating economic growth and national development,and construction of transportation infrastructure is critical. This project developed a method to detect, classify, monitor, and track objects during the construction, maintenance, and rehabilitation of transportation infrastructure by using artificial intelligence and a deep learning approach. This study evaluated the performance of AI and deep learning algorithms to compare their performance in detecting and classifying the equipment in various construction scenes. Our goal was to find the optimized balance between the model capabilities in object detection and memory processing requirements. Due to the lack of a comprehensive image database specifically developed for transportation infrastructure construction projects, the first portion of this study focused on preparing a comprehensive database of annotated images for various classes of equipment and machinery that are commonly used in roadway construction and rehabilitation projects. The second part of the project focused on training the deep learning models and improving the accuracy of the classification and detection algorithms. The outcomes of the trained and improved deep learning classification model were promising in terms of the precision and accuracy of the model in detecting specific objects at a highway construction site. It should be noted that the scope of this project was limited to the image and video data recorded from the ground-level and cannot be extended to Uncrewed Aerial System (UAS) data. This study provides valuable insights on the potentials of AI and deep learning to improve the monitoring and thus safety and efficiency of transportation infrastructure construction.

USDOT Priorities:

This project supports one of the main USDOT RD&T strategic goals which is “Improving the durability and extending the life of transportation infrastructure.”