China pioneers intelligent transport systems for enhanced safety and efficiency

Artificial rain poured down inside a tunnel-like testing facility in Beijing, where researchers recreated difficult road conditions for intelligent driving tests. In Tianjin, wind, waves, currents, and tides in the Bohai Bay appeared in real-time on a large digital screen, helping scientists calculate safer routes for giant vessels entering the port. In Dalian, Liaoning province, Northeast China, data from China's Xin Hong Zhuan, the world's first intelligent vessel designed for both research and maritime teaching practice, flowed back to a shore-based control center, where operators could monitor — and, if needed, remotely assist — the ship's navigation.

From highways and ports to waterways and deep-sea equipment, researchers are working to solve a new set of challenges: how to better manage large-scale traffic flows, how to identify risks earlier, how to support safer navigation in complex waters, and how to make critical equipment more reliable and self-dependent.

Roads that can "read" traffic

At the State Key Laboratory of Intelligent Transportation Systems in Beijing's Tongzhou district, researchers are exploring how roads can become active participants in transport safety and efficiency, rather than remaining passive infrastructure.

For a long time, road safety has largely depended on drivers observing traffic conditions by themselves. But with intelligent sensing, communication devices, and cloud-based platforms, roads are no longer just physical surfaces carrying vehicles. They are becoming part of a system that can sense risks, send warnings, and support traffic management.

"Vehicle-road cooperation is not simply about connecting vehicles and roads," said Wang Lin, deputy director of the laboratory and director of the intelligent transport research center at the Research Institute of Highway under the Ministry of Transport. "It is about changing the way people travel."

Wang said the goal is to make "vehicles understand roads, and roads remind vehicles".

"In the past, roads were mainly 'read' by people," Wang said. "Now, we are using machines and automated systems to read roads so that vehicles, roads, and cloud platforms can work together."

He said vehicle-road coordination could significantly improve traffic efficiency and reduce risks caused by human error.

"Human factors are involved in about 95 percent of traffic accidents," Wang said. "Through automated driving and vehicle-road coordination, we hope to reduce such risks. For example, in vehicle platooning, the distance between vehicles may be reduced from the current level of around 200 meters to 20 meters or even 10 meters, which could greatly increase the capacity of a single lane."

This approach reflects a major change in highway development. China has built one of the world's largest road networks, but as the network expands, the focus is increasingly shifting from building roads to operating them better.

Inside the laboratory, researchers are trying to make intelligent transport systems reliable enough for real-world use.

In a 250-meter laboratory tunnel, rain can be made to fall at the push of a button, while fog, low visibility, and water-covered road surfaces can be repeatedly recreated. Li Zhenhua, a senior engineer at the laboratory, said the facility allows researchers to bring dangerous weather conditions indoors, instead of waiting for them to appear on real roads.

"Extreme weather on real roads is difficult to predict and even more difficult to test safely," Li said. "Here, we can reproduce the same scenario again and again, compare the data, and improve the system step by step."

An eight-degree-of-freedom driving simulator provides another testing environment. With a 360-degree panoramic projection system, surround sound, and a motion platform, it can recreate different vehicle types, roads, and weather conditions, including rain, snow, fog, wind, and thunder. Such systems allow researchers to test driving behavior and intelligent transport technologies without exposing vehicles or people to real danger.

The laboratory also has an automated driving test road covering expressway, urban road, national and provincial highway, and rural road scenarios. It includes intersections, ramps, toll stations, bus stops, and a simulated tunnel, supporting research, evaluation, and demonstration of automated driving technologies.

Making waterways more predictable

In Tianjin, researchers are applying a similar logic to water transport: making risks visible before they turn into accidents.

At a large hydraulic testing base in Tianjin, a massive wave flume stretches for more than 450 meters. It can generate waves as high as 3.5 meters and recreate extreme sea conditions for large-scale and even full-scale model tests.

Here, researchers are bringing waves into the laboratory.

The facility belongs to the Tianjin Research Institute for Water Transport Engineering under the Ministry of Transport. It is used to study coastal engineering disaster prevention, sediment transport, wave-structure interaction, and the dynamic response of large floating structures.

"This is a large-scale wave flume with leading comprehensive performance," said Chen Hanbao, chief scientist at the institute.

Chen suggests that many coastal engineering projects undergo standard testing and feasibility studies, yet unexpected problems may still arise after they are put into use. This can be partly explained by the scale effect: small models tend to preserve the outline of a structure at the expense of important details.

"Large-scale tests, on the other hand, allow researchers to better understand how ports, breakwaters, and offshore structures behave under real wave conditions," he added.

The same facility has also supported the development of intelligent dredging robots. In the past, dredging often meant removing sediment after it had already accumulated. With a better understanding of tides, currents, and sediment transport, the process can become more preventive and precise.

This reflects a broader change in water transport: technology is making a complex and unpredictable environment more measurable, calculable, and manageable.

At the institute's Laboratory for Safety and Emergency Technology Research in the Storage and Transportation of Dangerous Goods, researchers are moving another safety barrier forward.

China transports more than 1.4 billion metric tons of dangerous goods by water each year, accounting for about 40 percent of the country's total dangerous goods transport volume. While they are essential for industrial production and economic activities, these goods also bring risks, especially when cargo is falsely reported, concealed, or transported under unsuitable conditions.

According to Lu Linlin, an associate researcher on the institute's safety team, the laboratory has built a full-process technical support system covering material properties, transport conditions, risk warning, and emergency response.

Researchers can simulate temperatures ranging from minus 40 C to 80 C to test the strength and sealing performance of dangerous goods packaging. A handheld identification device can determine the identity of a liquid within seconds, helping inspectors screen risks earlier.

Such technologies are steering waterway management from experience-based judgment to data-driven coordination.

From shore-based control to the deep sea

At Dalian Maritime University, the focus extends from ports and waterways to intelligent shipping and deep-sea equipment. At the university's shore-based digital operation and control center for intelligent ships, navigation status, engine data, energy efficiency indicators, and surrounding sea conditions from the Xin Hong Zhuan are transmitted back to shore in real-time.

The center serves as a "shore-based cockpit" for intelligent vessels. In open waters, ships can rely more on autonomous systems; in narrow waterways, during bad weather, or in emergencies, shore-based operators can provide remote support or take control.

Yin Yong, a professor at Dalian Maritime University's Navigation College, said the system can give captains real-time advice on speed and course, while also supporting autonomous navigation in open seas.

"It is not just a system on shore," Yin said. "The laboratory has one set, and the vessel has one set as well. The two sides can work together. The system can advise the captain on what speed to take, what course to follow, and, when the ship reaches the open ocean, support autonomous navigation."

Yin said intelligent shipping is not simply about installing sensors on vessels or removing crews overnight. Instead, it is about building coordination among ships, shore-based platforms, AI systems, and human operators.

In deeper waters, Chinese researchers are also advancing domestically developed deep-sea equipment. A full-ocean-depth winch system developed by a team led by Li Wenhua, a professor at Dalian Maritime University, is described by researchers as a "lifeline" connecting scientific research vessels with deep-sea equipment.

"Lowering equipment into the deep sea is like flying a kite at a depth of 10,000 meters," Li said. The cable must be light, strong, stable, and orderly, while also transmitting power, control signals, and images, and safely retrieving samples.

The technologies seen in these laboratories are not confined to research papers or demonstration screens. Many have already been applied in highways, ports, waterways, ship operations, and deep-sea exploration, offering practical solutions to real problems facing China's transport system.

As artificial intelligence, intelligent sensing, digital platforms, and advanced equipment move into real transport scenarios, China's transport development is entering a new stage — one focused not only on extending infrastructure networks but also on improving the intelligence, safety, and resilience of the entire system.