AI Scanned Alexandria’s Streets. What Did It Find?
By Pat Malone | Zebra Press Staff
ALEXANDRIA, VA — A City vehicle equipped wwith cameras, radar, LiDAR and artificial intelligence spent part of this year scanning streets in Alexandria’s West End and Old Town.
The scanning is over. Now Alexandria is analyzing what the technology found.
The work is part of SmartScan, a pilot program under the City’s SMART Roadway Management Initiative. Alexandria is working with the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute on the project, which is being funded through a $900,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Strengthening Mobility and Revolutionizing Transportation, or SMART, program.
Beginning Tuesday, March 17, the vehicle traveled Alexandria streets collecting information about pavement, traffic signs, roadway markings and other transportation infrastructure.
The results could give Alexandria a detailed look at street conditions in the two areas where the technology was tested.
Four Systems Tested
Alexandria tested technology from four companies.
Vaisala and Vialytics provided smartphone-based systems. Cyvl used cameras and LiDAR, while Roadway Management Technologies used cameras and radar.
The Virginia Tech Transportation Institute also used a Comma.AI system for what the City describes as “ground truthing.”
Instead of relying only on inspections or reports from residents, the technology can identify infrastructure conditions while a vehicle travels the street.
The pilot was conducted in the West End and Old Town Historic District.
City officials want to know whether the technology can accurately identify pavement conditions, signs, roadway markings and other infrastructure, and whether the information can be incorporated into systems Alexandria already uses.
If the pilot works, the technology could eventually be used elsewhere in the city.
Results Still to Come
The City’s Smart Roadway Management page was updated Wednesday, September 23. It says data analysis took place during spring and summer 2026, with reporting scheduled for fall 2026 through winter 2027.
The final findings have not been posted.
Those results should provide a clearer picture of what the four systems detected and how well each performed.
Among the information that could emerge is which streets had the poorest pavement conditions, where signs or roadway markings need attention and whether the technology found problems that had not already been reported.
The evaluation should also help determine whether one system performed better than the others and whether Alexandria wants to continue or expand the program.
Privacy and the Cameras
The equipment collected images while traveling through residential and commercial areas.
According to the City, faces, license plates, building interiors and animals were automatically blurred.
The vehicle was not self-driving. A licensed City employee drove it while the equipment collected information.
The project also raises questions about how the collected information is stored, how long it is retained and who can access it.
Part of Alexandria’s Smart Mobility Work
SmartScan is one part of a broader effort to use technology to manage Alexandria’s transportation system.
The City is developing a Digital Mobility Ecosystem that includes what it calls a “digital twin,” a virtual model of Alexandria’s transportation network.
The system is intended to combine information from traffic signals, sensors and other infrastructure. The City says it could eventually be used to model traffic conditions and test possible transportation changes before they are made on Alexandria streets.
Alexandria is also working with Virginia Tech on a Smart Mobility Lab involving transportation technology and real-time information.
The SmartScan pilot could help determine whether roadway-condition data becomes part of that larger system.
What Happens Next
For residents, the technology itself may ultimately matter less than what Alexandria does with the information it collected.
The City’s final report could identify streets, signs and pavement markings that need work and show whether automated scanning gives Alexandria a better way to find problems before residents have to report them.
The next question will be what the City fixes, and when.
