Honda and DriveOhio Complete Pilot of Nation's First Proactive Roadway Maintenance System Aimed at Creating Safer Roads

• Honda led two-year project funded by Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT), in collaboration with i-Probe Inc., Parsons Corporation and the University of Cincinnati
• Prototype Honda Proactive Roadway Maintenance System can detect potholes, faded lane markings, road roughness levels, and damaged guardrails, signs and shoulder drop-offs
• New system achieved 99% accuracy for damaged and obstructed signs, 93% accuracy for damaged guardrails and an average of 89% accuracy for potholes
• Automated road condition detection could save ODOT over $4.5 million annually
• In the future, crowd-sourced road condition data will empower drivers to play an active role in creating safer and well-maintained roadways in their communities

COLUMBUS, Ohio, Jan. 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Honda and DriveOhio, the smart mobility hub of the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT), have completed a first-of-its-kind pilot project demonstrating how real-time vehicle-generated data can detect and report road deficiencies. Conducted in collaboration with technology partners i-Probe Inc., Parsons (NYSE:PSN), and the University of Cincinnati, the project verified the feasibility of an automated road condition management and reporting system to help state DOTs proactively optimize maintenance while reducing costs and creating safer roadways.

Honda is committed to advancing safety for everyone sharing the road. Under its global safety slogan "Safety for Everyone," Honda is expanding its focus to include advanced safety and driver assistive technologies, efforts to enhance safety awareness to influence driver behavior and improve the traffic safety ecosystem by working with government, industry and community partners – including new initiatives such as the Proactive Roadway Maintenance System. 

Honda has been advancing development of its prototype Proactive Roadway Maintenance System since 2021. During the pilot, ODOT team members drove Honda test vehicles equipped with advanced vision and LiDAR sensors to monitor approximately 3,000 miles of roads in central and southeastern Ohio. The vehicles operated under a wide range of real-world conditions, including multiple road types in rural and urban environments, varied weather, and different times of the day. The Proactive Roadway Maintenance System detected road conditions and infrastructure deficiencies, providing ODOT with actionable insights by identifying the following:

• Worn or obstructed road signs
• Damage to guardrails and cable road barriers
• Pothole development, including size and location
• Condition of shoulder drops, including the percentage and depth of drop off 
• Insufficient roadway striping that affects the functionality of some driver-assistance features, such as lane-keeping assist functions
• Rough road quality, regardless of the vehicle's age or condition

As the Honda test vehicles detected the condition of critical roadway surfaces, pavement markings, and roadside assets, ODOT operators were able to review the deficiencies in real time through web dashboards developed by Honda and Parsons. ODOT used the data to cross-reference its regular visual inspections.

• Data collected by the vehicles was processed using Edge AI models, transmitted to a Honda cloud platform for analysis, and integrated into Parsons iNET® Asset Guardian system.
• This implemented a pipeline capable of automatically generating prioritized work orders for ODOT maintenance teams.
• Work orders can be grouped by severity and proximity, with the iNET® Asset Guardian system streamlining workflows to enhance efficiencies across field maintenance operations.  

i-Probe provided data validation as well as analysis expertise for road roughness and lane marking conditions. The University of Cincinnati helped Honda integrate the sensors on the test vehicles, led the damage detection feature development including potholes, guardrails, signs, and shoulder drops, and provided system maintenance service to ODOT during the trial operation.

Pilot Results: Highly Accurate Detection of Road Deficiencies

The pilot program covered a total of approximately 3,000 miles. Results verified that automated detection with the Proactive Roadway Maintenance System achieved high accuracy for signs, guardrails and shoulder drop-offs, and delivered strong pothole detection across most road types:

• 99% accuracy for damaged or obstructed signs
• 93% accuracy for damaged guardrails
• 89% average accuracy for potholes

An AI feedback loop pipeline was built that enabled ODOT team members to flag misdetections, helping the system learn and improve over time.

Insights from testing over approximately 3,000 miles showed that only a small percentage of roads had insufficient lane markings, suggesting that restriping schedules could be optimized. Vehicle sensor data also reliably measured road roughness levels and provided valuable insights for maintenance planning. The Proactive Roadway Maintenance System further detected high‑severity shoulder drop‑offs that were difficult to identify through routine visual inspection, successfully flagging these conditions across approximately 3,000 miles of roadway.

By reducing the need for manual inspections, the system enhances safety for maintenance crews and minimizes their exposure to traffic hazards. The project team estimates that automated road condition detection could save ODOT over $4.5 million annually through less manual inspection time, optimized maintenance schedules, and prevention of costly deferred repairs through proactive inspection.

As part of the next phase of testing, the project team is exploring ways to scale the prototype Proactive Roadway Maintenance System for real-world operations. In the future, Honda aims to empower its customers to contribute to safer, better roads through anonymized data sharing from their vehicles. This community-focused approach creates a sense of shared ownership at the road operation level, enabling drivers to move from simply using the roadways to actively improving them.

The project was driven by a strong public, private and academic collaboration, bringing together complementary expertise from each partner to deliver impactful results. More information on the project team is available here.

Executive Comments:

Ohio Department of Transportation/DriveOhio:

"At the heart of this technology is our shared goal to keep our roadways safe for all users," said Pam Boratyn, ODOT Director. "This Proactive Roadway Maintenance System also creates a safer environment for our workers while they gather the critical information and data needed to ensure Ohio's highways are maintained."

Honda:

"This pilot of the Honda Proactive Roadway Maintenance System empowers drivers to play an active role in creating safer roadways and communities while helping agencies like ODOT improve maintenance operations," said Sue Bai, chief engineer, Sustainability and Business Development at American Honda Motor Co., Inc. "By using real-time vehicle data to detect road hazards and infrastructure issues, Honda, ODOT and our project partners are demonstrating how smarter, adaptive solutions can enhance safety, reduce costs and enhance safety for everyone sharing the road."

i-Probe Inc.:

"What makes this project meaningful is how everyday vehicle sensor data can be translated into decision-ready insights for transportation agencies," said Daisuke Oshima, president and CEO of i-Probe Inc. "Production vehicle sensors are designed primarily for driving and safety – not for asset monitoring – but their ability to collect data continuously during daily driving creates unique value at scale. Unlocking that value requires analytics specifically designed to account for these characteristics, and this project shows how vehicle sensor data can complement existing inspection programs and support more proactive asset management."

Parsons:  

"This project gave us a deeper understanding of the challenges transportation agencies face in maintaining critical roadside assets and the multiple operational layers involved in identifying, tracking, and managing maintenance activities," said Jodie Bare-Thompson, vice president, Global Digital Solutions & Operations for Parsons. "Addressing those challenges required close collaboration with agency leadership and maintenance teams, alongside Honda and the University of Cincinnati, to collectively explore how vehicle sensor data and AI can augment existing operations by operationalizing data and automating processes. Our systems integration approach, including iNET Asset Guardian, helps bring that intelligence to life for real operational impact, but its success is fundamentally dependent on the quality of the sensor data and the intelligence applied at the edge. The future of crowd-sourced vehicle data for asset detection and condition assessment is very real, and our role as a systems integrator is to make that data actionable for our clients."

University of Cincinnati (UC):

"We are introducing cutting-edge technologies for evaluating and maintaining transportation infrastructure, enabling agencies to make more timely and informed decisions," said UC Professor Munir Nazzal, director of the Center for Smart, Sustainable & Resilient Infrastructure. "This project represents a first-of-its-kind collaboration among an automotive OEM, a state Department of Transportation, a university and industry partners to leverage vehicle sensor data for assessing roadway conditions, enhancing safety and reducing infrastructure maintenance costs."

Honda Commitment to Safety

Honda is committed to further advancing safety for everyone sharing the road, which is captured in the Honda global safety slogan "Safety for Everyone." The company has established a global goal to achieve zero traffic collision fatalities involving Honda motorcycles and automobiles by 2050. To achieve this goal, Honda is expanding its focus beyond advanced safety and driver assistive technologies alone, to include efforts to augment safety awareness to modify driver behavior and improve the traffic safety ecosystem by working with government, industry and community partners. 

Honda operates two of the world's most sophisticated crash-test facilities in Ohio and Japan, and is responsible for numerous pioneering efforts in crashworthiness, collision compatibility and pedestrian safety.  

Advanced passive safety features include the proprietary Honda Advanced Compatibility Engineering™ (ACE™) body structure and next-generation driver and passenger front airbag technology, which are designed to provide a high level of collision protection for occupants. Advanced active safety and driver-assistive systems found in Honda Sensing® and AcuraWatch™ technologies, now on over 10 million on U.S. roads, are designed to reduce the frequency and severity of collisions while also serving as a technological and perceptual bridge to the more highly automated vehicles of the future. 

Learn more at https://www.honda.com/safety. 

Important Notice

Although the information included in this press release is accurate as of the date of publication, this information is subject to change at any time without notice. American Honda Motor Co., Inc. assumes no responsibility for updating this information.

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SOURCE Honda