Thomas Lundberg works at the Operations and Maintenance unit as a Research Engineer and expert in road surface condition assessment, with a particular focus on maintenance planning and operation.
His work primarily concerns paved roads, although gravel roads are also included within his area of expertise. A major part of his work is linked to road surface measurement – a technique that uses laser technology to assess the condition of the road.
International standardisation work
Thomas is actively involved in international standardisation. He is the convenor of an ISO working group (TC 43/SC 1/WG 39) focusing on road surface texture, and also chairs a CEN group (TC 227/WG 5/TG 1) working on road surface evenness. This work is reported nationally to the Swedish Institute for Standards (SIS).
Assignments for Nordic road authorities
Across the Nordic region, Thomas leads several assignments for national road authorities related to the validation and verification of equipment used to assess road surface condition. Road condition data derived from road surface measurements is the primary basis for decisions on where, when and how maintenance actions should be carried out. It is therefore essential that the data used is of known and high quality in order to ensure reliability and usability.
Research in this field aims to provide decision-makers with as reliable and comprehensive data as possible for planning maintenance at the right time – with the goal of achieving low life-cycle costs while ensuring safe and comfortable roads.
VTI Mobile Research Platform
In 2024, VTI procured a modern, multifunctional measurement system – the VTI Mobile Research Platform – a road measurement vehicle designed to handle most assignments related to road and roadside conditions.
The platform has three main functions:
- Road surface condition measurement
- Road environment mapping (mobile mapping)
- Open research platform (for data collection to support research studies)
Current focus areas Thomas and the road surface measurement team are currently working on:
- Standardisation of road surface condition variables
- Data quality and verification methods for road surface measurement
- Mobile mapping and road surrounding measurement
- Development of measurement variables and methods for maintenance and operations planning
- Data quality and verification for connected vehicles and mobile phone data collection
- New measurement technologies for assessing road condition
- Quality assurance and follow-up methods for contracted road works at project level.
Current project
Structural condition of roads – a project providing decision support to the Swedish and Finnish Transport Administrations on strategies for mapping the structural capacity of the national road network, an area where information is currently lacking.
About road surface measurement
Road surface measurement is an umbrella term for assessing the condition of road surfaces, most commonly using laser technology. Modern laser-based measurement techniques were developed at VTI in the late 1970s in collaboration with a Swedish sensor manufacturer in Partille.
Earlier methods using ultrasound and contact-based measuring wheels were replaced by laser sensors – a non-contact approach that is both more accurate and significantly more reliable, with lower maintenance requirements.
Current project
Structural condition of roads
A project providing decision support to the Swedish and Finnish Transport Administrations on strategies for mapping the structural capacity of the national road network, an area where information is currently lacking.
Anna Arvidsson Senior Researcher
Anna Niska Senior Research Leader
Christian Glantz Research Engineer
Claudia Bratu Research Engineer
Henrik Bjurström Researcher
Jaakko Kemppainen Engineer
Jenny Eriksson Analyst
Johan Egeskog Research Engineer
Jones Karlström Analyst
Pelle Jonsson Senior Researcher
Peter Andrén Researcher
Thomas Lundberg Research Engineer
Organisation
Research Department of Infrastructure
Unit: Infrastructure Maintenance
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