The Province of Utrecht, in the Netherlands, is collecting data from vehicles during their journey to enhance road safety. Cars, buses, trucks etc. are able to share their position, speed, braking patterns and more. The Province is using the Road Monitor (ROMO) programme to process the connected vehicle data to design safer roads.
Credit: AISIN
Background
Initiated by the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management (Rijkswaterstaat) in 2022, the ROMO programme built a framework for connected vehicle data sharing among stakeholders, including all local and regional governments in the Netherlands. A key partner in the process is Mercedes-Benz, which supplies anonymised vehicle data. The programme aims to maintain optimal safety and efficiency of the Dutch road networks of 130,000km.
The ROMO programme provides data to local and regional governments, opening the door to enhanced road safety.
The Province of Utrecht has taken advantage of this shared data and have been using it to work on three areas:
- Asset management (maintenance)
- Extreme weather (slippery conditions, flooding)
- Road safety (high-risk locations)
Credit: Mercedes-Benz
The problem
Utrecht’s solution answers three questions after implementing the ROMO programme.
- How can local and regional governments translate national innovation into local solutions that adapt to their unique context?
As a provincial government, Utrecht considers how to apply national data within its specific networks, which cover both busy city streets in the Municipality of Utrecht and rural cycle paths in the Vecht region.
- How can data become action?
The ROMO programme provides information but not real-time insights to enable predictive maintenance or targeted measures. Local and regional governments are responsible for utilising the data for the public good.
- How can local and regional governments cooperate with each other?
The ROMO programme prompts collaboration between municipalities, the province, and water boards, which work at cross-purposes, with their own systems and priorities. The programme is both an opportunity to enhance collaboration and a challenge that requires committed coordination. It fits in the Dutch government bodies’ joint agreements on data sharing and responsibility.
How does Utrecht leverage connected vehicle data?
The ROMO programme helps the Province of Utrecht to enhance road safety by facilitating:
- Increased Traffic Safety: identification of potential accident hotspots through Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) data analysis.
- Efficient Winter Management: real-time detection of adverse road conditions for quick winter service deployment.
- Predictive Maintenance: early detection of road damage for efficient maintenance.
Through the ROMO programme, Utrecht receives standardised anonymous vehicle datasets. Using these datasets, the province has developed their own asphalt degradation app to introduce predictive maintenance in the road management programme.
In addition, the ROMO data is linked to Utrecht’s Road Network Registration (WNR), giving road authorities a consolidated overview of the network and its usage. The data dashboard shows potential accident blackspots, which helps prevent collisions proactively.
Challenges and solutions
Utrecht identified the following challenges when utilising connected vehicle data.
- Organisational trust in new data: convincing people who actually work with the data by organising demonstrations to show how data matches their experience.
- Data privacy: the anonymised, aggregated data from Car-to-X and other systems protects the car owners’ privacy. Clear communication about how this works builds support.
- Regional priorities: as the ROMO programme is a national initiative, the focus may differ from the actual context in Utrecht. For instance, the ROMO programme centres on motorways, while Utrecht’s interest leans toward cycle routes and low-speed zones. The region therefore added their own use cases to the programme.
Results
By leveraging connected vehicle data, Utrecht achieved the following results.
- Fewer incidents of slippery roads: in winter 2025/2026, reports of slippery roads fell by 25% in the pilot municipalities.
- Cost savings: predictive maintenance helps save 75,000 euros per year on unnecessary repairs.
- Better-informed investments: objective data to support management of the road repair schedule.
Benefits of connected vehicle data
Connected vehicle data brings the following benefits:
- Providing objective, continuous, and reliable data. Connected vehicle data measures road quality without additional inspections. It significantly improves the cost efficiency of road management in Utrecht, where 29 road authorities operate. Local governments can act on factual information without relying on assumptions or waiting for additional inspections.
- Driving behavioural change within local and regional governments. Connected vehicle data demonstrates what data can deliver and encourages a welcoming attitude towards working with data.
- Facilitating smarter choices in maintenance and management.
- Reduced workload as the demand for manual inspections is minimised.
In addition, the Romo programme prompts agreements on data sharing between municipalities and local government bodies, facilitating data exchange on other projects like climate adaptation.
The Romo programme lays the foundation for smart traffic systems and autonomous vehicles in Utrecht as roads are continuously monitored.
For more information on connected vehicle data
UNDP SDG Local Action released a new guide, “Designing safer roads in cities through connected vehicle data,” to help local governments explore applications of connected vehicle data in cities. Developed through a four-session working group, the guidelines reflect the experience of the province of Utrecht and the cities of Buenos Aires, Istanbul, London, and Florence.
Read the guidelines here:
