The roads of the future 'will be like Scalextric'

The deterioration of asphalt is something you’re undoubtedly familiar with; think how broken your local roads are in the immediate aftermath of winter. Fixing them isn’t easy either. You’ll be equally aware of how long they’re left broken.

The fix to that is inspired by Scalextric, and the way the age-old toy’s track panels snap together. In the future, it's planned that roads would be split into small sections, made off-site and transported in, where they’d simply slot in, one after another. If there’s damage to one, it’s quickly replaced, ending the inconvenience of closing whole stretches of road to re-tarmac.

Dutch company VolkerWessels is currently working on hollow, plastic road panels that fit this system. And the UK’s Transport Research Laboratory (TRL) is developing a far wider reaching ‘Forever Open Road’ project, exploring all manner of projected features and characteristics for our roads.

So the road panels could be filled with telecommunications, allowing cars and roads to speak to each other for more accurate and relevant traffic reporting. They could provide drainage for flood defences. They could even change colour in relation to temperature, as a visual aid to drivers.

And as new features are developed, old panels are simply snapped out and replaced with new ones. “Roads don’t have to be just roads,” TRL says…