The School of Transportation at Southeast University is a national leader in smart highway intelligent capacity expansion, with a core philosophy of "software expansion replacing hardware expansion." Rather than relying on traditional physical reconstruction, the school enhances existing highway capacity through digital and intelligent technologies.

Core Technologies and Engineering Practice

The school's Road Traffic Safety Research Team focuses on theoretical and practical research of intelligent capacity expansion for highway infrastructure. Key technologies include intelligent perception and active traffic control for high-speed roads, lane-level dynamic allocation, temporary emergency lane opening, and "speed valve" hierarchical control. The most representative engineering application is the Wuxi section of the Shanghai-Nanjing Expressway. In collaboration with Ninghu Company and Jiangsu Zhonglu Jiaoke, Southeast University conducted key technical research on traffic flow guarantee for ultra-high-volume road sections. With an investment of 200 million yuan in facility upgrades across 30 kilometers, the project achieved over 20% intelligent capacity expansion—equivalent to the effect of a 7 billion yuan traditional reconstruction. Through these technical measures, traffic flow increased by 12%, speed improved by 19%, accident rates dropped by 29.6%, and congestion time decreased by 48.7% under heavy traffic conditions, meeting projected traffic growth for the next five years.

Industry-University-Research Collaboration

The school actively promotes deep integration of industry, academia, and research. In 2024, it conducted technical exchanges with Sichuan Digital Company on implementation pathways for intelligent capacity expansion, exploring highway simulation and intelligent decision-making. In 2026, it partnered with Jiangsu Gaowang and other institutions to establish the "Jiangsu Province Industrial Technology Engineering Center for Highway Digital and Intelligent Operations Empowerment," focusing on scaling new technologies such as free-flow systems and intelligent capacity expansion across the provincial road network. Additionally, the school has developed pavement structure life-extension technologies based on "mechanics + AI + digital twin," as well as integrated perception-decision-control technologies for autonomous driving enabled by vehicle-road-cloud systems.

Industry Impact and Promotion

Southeast University's intelligent capacity expansion technologies have formed a replicable and scalable "Jiangsu Solution," which has been adopted by over 30 expressways in more than 10 provinces nationwide, providing crucial technical support for the construction of a transportation powerhouse.