By Tom Austin-Morgan

In the UK, high-profile campaigns repeatedly draw attention to the risks faced by those working on major roads from collisions with passing vehicles and near-misses in live traffic, to distressing incidents of verbal and physical abuse. 

A recent campaign highlighted the dangers faced by road workers across Scotland’s trunk roads, following an increase in incursions into designated road working areas. Meanwhile, reports of violence against road workers (including 2,307 recorded cases of verbal or physical abuse in England in 2023) have made national headlines.

Given these risks, can technology, particularly robotics and automation, help reduce the exposure of human workers to danger? 

Europe’s push toward robotic road maintenance

In Europe, the InfraROB research initiative provides a compelling glimpse of what’s possible, and where the UK could head next.

InfraROB is a Horizon 2020 project funded by the EU that ran between September 2021 and February 2025, aimed to automate high-risk road maintenance tasks. Its focus areas include robotised pothole repair, crack sealing, resurfacing, and line marking, all supported by advanced sensing, data analytics and V2X (vehicle-to-everything) communication systems.

Field tests have reportedly demonstrated a 50% reduction in fatal accidents during high-risk maintenance operations, as well as a 35% reduction in maintenance costs, 30% fewer traffic disruptions, and a 25% improvement in network capacity. The project also integrates fibre-optic pavement sensing and a unified platform linking pavement management systems (PMS) and traffic management systems (TMS).

InfraROB’s technologies are said to have offered valuable insight into how robotic systems might support safer highway operations across Europe.

UK trials and adjacent technologies

While the UK has yet to deploy fully autonomous road-maintenance robots at scale, several related trials point toward growing interest in automation and worker safety.

In Epsom, gas network SGN and ULC Technologies have developed and tested the Robotic Roadworks and Excavation System (RRES), a fully electric, self-contained platform equipped with a robotic arm for excavation and reinstatement tasks.

National Highways is also backing innovation through its Hazard Protection on Roads Accelerator, funding trials of new technologies such AI computer vision, hazard data, and notification technology.

These examples suggest that, even without full robotic deployment, automation and sensing can already help reduce exposure to risk on the UK’s road network.

Automation could remove workers from the most hazardous roadside tasks, improve consistency, and cut project time, but it brings its own challenges. Robotic systems must achieve high reliability and safety in unpredictable environments, and the UK’s ‘Code of Practice: automated vehicle trialling’ requires rigorous oversight and safety validation.

Integration is another hurdle. Automated systems, sensors, and traffic management platforms must interoperate seamlessly. Costs, workforce training, and public acceptance will all influence adoption. And while robots may mitigate collision risks, they cannot prevent the abuse and aggression that many roadside teams endure, issues that still demand education, enforcement, and cultural change.

Image: road worker applying traffic resistant paint. Credit: Shutterstock.