Connected and Automated Vehicles

As automated, connected and electric vehicle technologies continue to develop, road agencies across Australia and New Zealand need to prepare infrastructure for new operating conditions. Technologies such as Automated Vehicles (AVs), Connected and Automated Vehicles (CAVs), Electric Vehicles (EVs), Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) and Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) place new demands on both physical and digital infrastructure. Many of these demands extend beyond the scope of current design standards.

This webinar presents the findings of Austroads Project CAV6428, which defines a set of high-level design principles to support infrastructure readiness for future mobility. The project reviewed international and local research, analysed existing Austroads and jurisdictional guidance, and engaged with Austroads member agencies to understand current challenges and priorities. The project outputs provide a structured foundation to support agencies through this transition, identifying key gaps and mapping how infrastructure capability can evolve over time.

The project identified 24 topic areas - 11 physical and 13 digital - where agencies require clearer direction to support emerging vehicle technologies. Across these topics, the report identifies 135 design principles covering areas such as managing transitions of control between automated and manual driving, ensuring readability of lane markings and signage, managing mixed traffic interactions, kerbside management for automated vehicles and EVs, ensuring reliable CAV communications, protecting data from cybersecurity threats, and supporting digital resilience.

The principles give agencies practical direction for planning and adapting infrastructure in an evolving technology environment. They support informed decision-making that reflects local context, operational needs and technology readiness. The principles are a flexible toolkit that agencies can apply selectively to suit different project types and stages of deployment, while supporting consistency across jurisdictions.

The project also developed an online mapping tool to help visualise and navigate the principles. This interactive matrices allow users to filter by topic area and explore how physical and digital considerations for vehicle technologies impact infrastructure.

In this session, presenters David Yee and Megan Sharkey explain the purpose and structure of the design principles, summarise the key physical and digital topic areas, outline how agencies can apply the principles in practice. The session will also demonstrate how the mapping tool can support practical application.

This webinar is relevant to professionals across road and transport agencies, including planners, designers, asset managers, ITS specialists and policy leads involved in preparing infrastructure for emerging mobility technologies.