A team of University of Technology Sydney engineers found the root causes of potholes and has found a way to fix them

According to UTS professor and civil engineer Behzad Fatahi who led the research team, the AI principle is tucked into the road compacting roller with a sensor they developed to quickly assess what can be done to repair potholes.

"What this technology does while replacing the surface of a road or building a new road, the vibrating roller detects if the soil is loose or dense," he said.

"We collect that data in real-time every second and can understand precisely the actual stiffness of the road under the roller."

The UTS team based their research on prevailing conditions of roads around the country, also considering the effects of changes in weather patterns, whether drought or heavy rainfall, which Prof Fatahi said, "no doubt were the root causes for why the roads have deteriorated".

"If it's heavy rains or flood, water runoff on road surface results in cracks on any surface, bitumen or asphalt. Water on the road penetrates from half a metre to two metres underneath the surface," he said.

"If those existing materials under the asphalt or bitumen road are not properly prepared, compacted and densified before laying the top asphalt surface, that water seepage will become very weak afterward.

"That's the key root cause of pothole issues we have because the soil underneath the surface is not well prepared and compacted."

The technology has been tested in various areas, yet the team continues to demonstrate it to road construction companies, the NSW government's road infrastructure arm and offered to train staff on the technology for current road projects.

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From these earlier tests, Prof Fatahi said, they gathered over 5,000 computer simulations of roadworks across NSW and would welcome roadworks contractors and councils to test and take their sensor technology to a field test.

"We have been reaching out and offered to collaborate with them so they can try this model if it works for them," he said.

"We can also offer training to engineering students who may be interested to do more research with us on this technology to repair very bad roads that impact road transport."

Prof Fatahi, originally from Iran before migrating to Australia two decades ago, said he started developing the technology as he became aware of billions of dollars spent on constructing roads and buildings.

"My expertise is related to building the foundation of infrastructure and how to make them stronger, safer, and cost-effective.

"[My team] came up with ideas to modernise construction practices in Australia because many lack technology advances such as using AI technology for all kinds of construction projects.

"I have been working on this soil compaction technique for decades and I see this promising in a process that can produce very good results to repair damaged roads."

The Daily Liberal has sought Dubbo Regional Council to comment on the technology as potholes become a dizzying matter on the 2,875 kilometres of roads it manages across the towns, particularly around Dubbo city's high-traffic areas.

"When we speak to residents in one street, they say please fix our road because it is a very important road then I go speak to other residents and they say the same thing," Dubbo mayor Mathew Dickerson said.

"It's the road they drive and it's very important to them and the problem is there are so many roads that are in very poor condition and from the council perspective we have to prioritise."

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But the council is cash-strapped and it had been "operating in deficit" by $23.3 million in arrears. Not even the nearly $1 million given to it by the NSW government can cover the costs of repairing thousands of potholes across the towns, Cr Dickerson revealed.

"It's terrible ... I've never seen these road conditions in the entire eastern seaboard as bad as it is now," he said.

"You have to go back to the time of horse and cart and dirt roads and cobblestones ... this is not just in Dubbo local government area, they're all in a terrible condition we've got this unprecedented event to look into.

"Operating in deficit means we don't have excess funds to start filling those potholes. First, we had the drought, then the pandemic, and both impacted our bottom line. Then the rains came causing more damage on our roads while we lack money for road repairs."

If the UTS technology had been widely tested and proven cost-effective, Cr Dickerson said, it may be worthwhile investigating further.

"Council will not waste ratepayers' money to experiment or go there and hope for the best. We've only used proven techniques for our roads for many years," Cr Dickerson said.

Since the potholes became an urgent matter for the regional councils in NSW, Cr Dickerson said they have submitted a standing proposal for the regional roads and transport minister Sam Farraway to look at researching better ways to construct roads.

"We can even look at what they're doing overseas with climate change conditions and how they are doing things differently and hopefully those research will make our road building cost-effective with long-term results," Cr Dickerson said.