Luminescent powder in paint has given a glow to 500 meters of Dutch highway, resulting in a trial section of glow-in-the-dark road.
Designer Daan Roosegaarde, who won best future concept for the idea at the Dutch Design Awards in 2012, is collaborating with Heijmans, a Dutch civil engineering firm, to create such interactive highways. Almost two years later, the project is coming to fruition with some adjustments, according Slate.
"The government is shutting down streetlights at night to save money," Roosegaarde said in an interview with the BBC. " This road is about safety and envisaging a more self-sustainable and more interactive world."
The Smart Highway Project originally included glowing weather symbols, such as snowflakes, that would light up at a certain temperature, but the first stretch of lit-up road only has illuminated hash marks and edge lines. The trial run is on a stretch of highway N329 in the town of Oss, located in the country's southeast region, according to Global News.
The green-lit paint markings charge in the daylight and can glow for up to eight hours, Global News reported. But some transportation officials have already raised concerns about the technology's durability in bad weather.
“The cost [of glow-in-the-dark technology] is usually relatively high in comparison to conventional markings,” Ajay Woozageer, a spokesperson for the ministry of transportation in Ontario, Canada, told Global News. “The durability of this product is unknown. For example, does the product perform on short winter days and long nights or under overcast and cloudy conditions?”