Meet Ella Jones

Ella has been an engineer for 11 years, she graduated in 2014 with a Civil Engineering Degree and has worked on some exciting and innovative projects during her time in the industry. Ella is passionate about harnessing digital technologies to drive positive changes in the way she and her team work and has seen the pace of change accelerating over the last decade.

Ella is currently a Senior Engineer at an engineering consultancy and is working on a large infrastructure project, upgrading a section of the Strategic Road Network to increase capacity and improve safety.

A day in Ella's life in 2025

Ella has begun work on a new project. She is happy to see that the National Highways Digital Twin contains all existing asset data, in a consistent format with no gaps. This enables her to quickly gain a thorough understanding of the section of network she is working on.

With the seamless transition of data into digital design tools, Ella has an outline design produced in under an hour! This allows Ella to focus on adding value through: enhancing safety, improving operational performance and delivering a better customer experience.

Ella starts planning digital rehearsals of her designs, to test against buildability with construction teams. This approach ensures early warning notice of any design conflicts, enhancing safety and efficiency for workers on site.

Ella notices that construction partners on an adjacent construction site have provided feedback on site conditions. These are automatically saved into design and Health & Safety files. Ella incorporates these notes into the design of the scheme she is working on.

In the afternoon, Ella is invited to attend a supply chain forum hosted by National Highways. At the forum, she receives updates on her responsibilities to support innovation, digital delivery and improve digital competency across the project design.

Meet Michael Sani

Michael has worked as a construction worker for over 25 years and has seen many changes in construction methods over the years. Michael is embracing this change as he is aware of the significant benefits of improving safety and delivering projects more efficiently.

Michael works for a large construction firm that builds major highway schemes. He is currently delivering a new highway upgrade on the SRN which is currently in the assembly phase.

A day in Michael’s life in 2025

Michael begins his day off-site, reviewing the manufacturing outputs for the standardised components needed for on-site assembly. Adoption of a ‘just-in-time delivery’ approach has improved safety by reducing time spent on the site.

After confirming the delivery schedules, Michael reviews the site risks captured as part of the design and digital rehearsal on his digital tablet. Michael’s tablet reminds him that it is time to travel to site. His journey is pre-planned and upon arrival his colleagues and suppliers are alerted.

Michael arrives at the construction site on time . He receives a safety update about a hazard notification issued from an adjacent site. Michael views the notification, performs appropriate safety checks, and confirms that the risk is not relevant to his site. He logs the update on the system.

Michael is notified of the delivery of standard components to the site. Michael confirms that virtual fencing is in place, enabling connected and semi-autonomous plant to be safely segregated from people. The introduction of this technology has improved safety and efficiency on site

Michael connects the plant to the Digital Twin design model. He confirms that any underground risks (e.g. hitting pipework) are factored into the plant installation plans. Everything is in order, and he confidently begins the installation process as scheduled.

Digital Roads 2025 – Improving design and construction activities

Our activities will be increasingly automated, modular and conducted off-site. This will result in safer production, reduced network disruption, increased productivity and smoother journeys for our customers.

Our focus on Digital Roads means that each year the design and construction of the SRN will be improved:

Meet Georgie Smith

Georgie has been working for National Highways for 20 years and is a maintenance worker on the SRN. Over her career Georgie has worked in several different maintenance roles and now leads a team responsible for planning and deployment in the South East. She is excited about the opportunities for her team to use data and technology to support their roles.

Georgie is currently working as a team leader in the planning and deployment of maintenance workers for delivery of asset maintenance in the South-East.

A day in Georgie’s life in 2025

An asset inspection alert appears in Georgie's workflow and shows a bridge inspection is planned for today. Georgie confirms the deployment of a drone survey, as these are frequently used to improve the safety of inspectors and reduce network disruption.

The drone report is returned within the hour and an issue is identified, without the risk of deploying personnel to the roadside or impacting traffic flows. The report shows a category 1 defect that requires urgent attention.

Georgie sends an alert (including traffic management plans) to the Regional Operations Centre, who approve the automated signalling schedule for later in the evening. Workflows are automatically issued to the bridge team and maintenance plans are finalised.

Georgie reflects on how the shift from reactive to predictive asset management has allowed her to work with operational colleagues to plan the interaction between maintenance and other events/traffic conditions. This has minimised disruption and improved customer experience.

The following day Georgie reviews progress with the works. The digital rehearsal has been added to work plans and site risks have been loaded to the workers tablets. Georgie is pleased to see the Digital Twin has been automatically updated to reflect progress.

Meet Mateo Garcia

Mateo has worked in a Regional Control Centre for 5 years. He loves his job and is passionate about ensuring customers’ journeys are as smooth and safe as possible. Mateo enjoys working for an organisation at the forefront of embracing technology and connectivity in road network operation.

Mateo is a Control Room Operator at National Highways and is responsible for operation of the network in the North-West of England, setting signs and signals to ensure the Strategic Road Network is safe and free flowing.

A day in Mateo’s life in 2025

Mateo begins his shift by attending a team briefing. His team leader informs them of an event in Manchester and asks Mateo to manage the necessary on-road resource deployments and diversion routes.

Mateo uses predictive tools to assess potential diversion routes. He works in collaboration with the NTIS team and local authorities to finalise and publish the diversion routes.

Mateo receives an automated alert informing him of an incident. He views the incident through CCTV cameras in the area and confirms that the signals have been set automatically and customers are being diverted around the incident.

Automated workflows have dispatched a traffic officer and Mateo tracks their progress, while also updating other responders in the area. Mateo is able to automatically access relevant information being captured by the Traffic Officers and share this with the police.

Mateo receives a message notifying him that this section is scheduled for maintenance works later today. He decides to postpone these works to avoid further network disruption. He updates the workflow, which automatically reschedules the maintenance teams, and shares updated network information with customers through their preferred channels.

Digital Roads 2025 – Improving operations and maintenance

Our operations will leverage data to drive increasingly pre-emptive interventions - resulting in improved asset resilience, increased asset life and a safer, smoother running network.

Our focus on Digital Roads means that each year the operation and maintenance of the SRN will be improved:

Meet Gary Baker

Gary is a Haulage driver and has been working for a large supermarket chain for the last 4 years. He is under pressure to make ‘just-in-time’ deliveries and meet corporate targets for deliveries. Gary has noticed that the quality of road information has improved over the years, enabling him to make informed decisions about his routes and respond to potential delays.

Gary uses the Strategic Road Network to complete his deliveries on time and deliver his cargo in good condition.

A day in Gary’s life in 2025

Gary’s scheduling manager informs him that due to planned roadworks on his usual route, his routing device has been updated to include National Highways' recommended diversion route. Gary is also aware that he can report any issues on his route to the depot and these will be automatically relayed to National Highways.

Before starting his journey, Gary checks the information on his routing device. Out of habit, he also uses his wayfinding app to confirm the fastest route and is reassured to see that both devices recommend the same route.

Gary has been driving smoothly when his routing device informs him of an incident ahead and recommends that he takes a lunch break earlier than planned, to minimise the delay. Gary accepts the proposal.

Gary finishes his early lunch and resumes his journey. His arrival time is updated and he is relieved to know that his customer has also been notified of the change.

Gary reaches his destination at the updated time and drops off his cargo. The customer is happy to receive the order at the communicated time. His routing device informs him that there are no delays on his return journey and he is excited to arrive home on time for his son's birthday party.

Meet Joyce Parsons

Joyce has commuted to work in Birmingham from her home in Stratford for three days per week for the past five years. She has always left early to avoid traffic but has noticed her journey times have become faster and more reliable each year.

Joyce is a regular commuter, who depends on the Strategic Road Network to travel to work each week. Joyce has a disability and uses a walking stick.

A day in Joyce’s life in 2025

When Joyce wakes up, her preferred wayfinding application notifies her of the expected journey time for the commute, which is slightly faster than usual.

Joyce sets out on her journey and joins the Strategic Road Network. The messaging on Joyce’s wayfinding app matches the variable messages which gives her confidence in the information.

While continuing her journey, Joyce receives a notification that all disabled parking bays are occupied at her usual service station, however, they are free at the subsequent station. Joyce stops to buy a coffee at the recommended station and parks in an available disabled parking bay.

During the journey, Joyce has enjoyed streaming a podcast, made possible due to enhanced connectivity. She is aware of the progress of SRN connectivity trials, which would result in her car never losing signal on the network. This makes her feel safer on the road.

On completing her journey, Joyce spots signs for the development of further Digital Roads enabled schemes and wants to know more. Joyce contacts National Highways via her tablet and receives a quick response back.

Digital Roads 2025 – Improving customers’ journeys

Our customers will be better informed and have trust in the journey information they access, ensuring that they feel safe and in control of their journey.

Our focus on Digital Roads means that each year our customers journey experience on the SRN will improve:

Rapid Engineering Model

Technology is changing the way infrastructure is designed, delivered and operated. The Rapid Engineering Model (REM) was developed by National Highways and is just one of the tools we are now using to increase the speed, quality and safety of road design. This will also form the basis of the creation of a company-wide Digital Twin.

So far, we have developed 11 schemes using the REM workflow. The time to produce the operational concepts for these schemes has decreased from around nine months for traditional approaches to a matter of weeks. Some aspects of preliminary design timescales have decreased from around a year to just eight weeks.

Alongside REM, we are using drones to build 3D maps of the network. We have recently mapped all 120 miles of M25 and are putting this data to immediate use on construction sites. Sharing this data across project teams will help to reduce carbon emissions by 95% (compared to traditional surveys) improve safety outcomes by reducing exposure of road workers to live traffic and minimise customer journey disruption caused by lane closures.

Connected and Autonomous Plant

Connected and Autonomous Plant will transform our construction sites by delivering safe, automated and efficient construction processs.

We are trialing multiple use cases for CAP. For example, we have deployed an automated dump truck trial as part of the A14 upgrade scheme. This is one of several steps we are taking for CAP to become the business as usual approach by 2035 and deliver £200bn of benefit by 2040.

Our Connected and Autonomous Plant 2035 roadmap sets the vision and key activities that need to be delivered for CAP to become the business as usual approach by 2035.

Intelligent maintenance techniques

We are trialling a new technique to prepare roads for resurfacing that promises to improve safety for road workers, use less water and increase efficiency.

Currently, when repairs are needed to concrete structures, workers use hand-held, high-pressure water jets to prepare the surface. It’s a laborious process that can take many hours. We worked with one of our suppliers to pilot a new automated system called Aqua Prep that combines the latest technology in high pressure water with robotic equipment. It is good for the environment because the technique uses only half the amount of water compared with our existing method, and it completes task much faster. Using techniques such as this more widely will improve safety and shorten roadworks, reducing disruption for road users.

Single view of the network and data trials

We are developing a Single View of the Network to enable our Regional Operational Control Centre colleagues to access reliable, fit-for-purpose network information through a single platform. This combines data feeds from disparate sources and enables our colleagues to easily access all available data in one place, improving the speed and accuracy of decision making. This will support incident detection and resolution, keeping traffic flowing smoothly.

We are creating an analytical solution to predict the impact of events (e.g. football matches) on traffic flow. This will enable our colleagues to take a more pre-emptive approach to network management.

We have also launched a trial to understand how third-party data might be used to improve the service we provide to our customers. In particular, we are exploring opportunities to use crowd-sourced incident data from Waze to reduce delays caused by congestion and improve incident clearance times.

The lessons and outcomes from these trials will form an integral part of our future company-wide Digital Twin, which will further improve our ability to oversee and manage the network.

Every Customer Has an Opinion (ECHO)

We are focused on enhancing our relationships with, and understanding of, our customers. A key element of this of this is enabling customers to quickly and easily tell us about their experiences of our services. Providing real-time feedback and insights to support continuous improvement and innovation.

In 2019 we launched ECHO, our digital real-time customer feedback collection tool. ECHO data is being used to identify and prioritise areas of improvement related to:

• the information we share with our customers
• format in which we share information
• customer experience when contacting National Highways directly.

We will continue to enhance and develop the ECHO tool (e.g. integration with other systems). This represents a key step forward that will inform many of our future service improvements.

Enabling a connected and autonomous future

The growth of connected and autonomous vehicles is expected to be one of the most significant changes ever to occur in transport. Connected systems promise integrated, reliable, and safer travel, whilst autonomy could increase accessibility, reduce incidents, and increase national productivity.

Working with other government authorities, agencies, academia and industry, we have conducted multiple CAV trials on the SRN. This forms part of our preparations to ensure the SRN is able to accommodate vehicles with varying levels of connectivity and autonomy.

We are clearly defining our role in the safe deployment and operation of CAVs on the SRN and are actively factoring this into our long-term planning and investment decisions.