Minding and mending our ways

Prof Wynand JvdM Steyn, Dean of the University of Pretoria (UP)’s Faculty of Engineering, Built Environment and Information Technology, delivered his inaugural address on 15 October 2024. The title of his presentation was “Minding and mending our ways”.

Prof Steyn is the former Head of the Department of Civil Engineering, and served as Chairperson of the School of Engineering. He is a qualified and registered civil engineer who spearheaded the development of the Engineering 4.0 facility at the University of Pretoria. His research interests include road pavement engineering, vehicle-pavement interaction, accelerated pavement testing, and pavement materials and instrumentation. He holds a B3 rating from the National Research Foundation (NRF), and his work is locally and internationally recognised.

He explained that roads are essential infrastructure that weave through the fabric of our societies. They are the conduits that connect communities, enabling access to education, healthcare, trade and safety. Beyond this functionality, roads also serve as the ties that bind us and shape our collective journey. “Vehicle-pavement interaction lies at the heart of road engineering,” he reflects. “It is the intricate dance between vehicle tyres and roads, where physics, materials science and engineering converge. This is where science meets practicality, ensuring that roads endure, vehicles ride smoothly, and our lives move forward.”

During his presentation, he took the audience through his 35 years of research on the interrelationships between roads, road users, and the ways in which roads affect journeys and users adapt to roads. The golden thread throughout his presentation was that “each other matters”. He also explained how important it is to be able to “read a road” to maintain it and ensure that it is fit for purpose. South Africa’s road network is the 11^th longest in total and the 18th longest paved road network globally. Of its entire length, however, only 20% is paved. Paved or unpaved, however, it serves the primary purpose of mobility and accessibility. 

Prof Steyn’s research journey has spanned from rudimentary to high-tech data collection and analysis, along with reflections on the meaning of such data and the opportunities to maintain and rehabilitate infrastructure. He shared his insights into this research's importance and implications for road users and infrastructure.

He reflected on how he has observed and quantified the interaction between the vehicle and the road pavement through research and industry collaboration. He refers to this as “minding our ways”. This gave way to his contribution to the construction, maintenance and rehabilitation of roads to ease the burdens of accessibility and mobility in support of communities. He calls this “mending our ways”. Research to improve the country’s road network relates to material challenges, an evaluation of the lifespan of the road pavement, the use of marginal materials and the advanced chemical treatment of such materials to ensure that it can repel water and other influences that affect the sensitivity of the road pavement to loading and environmental effects.

He provided examples from research that he has supervised in the Department of Civil Engineering related to transporting fresh produce such as tomatoes and avocadoes. He illustrated the impact this has had, not just on the supply chain, but also on the lives of the consumer and the people working in the industry. This is due to cost savings due to vehicle and road pavement improvements. This was achieved using sensors to monitor the road pavement, vehicles and the fresh produce transported. This gave way to the development of the “smart Avo”. This is a 3D-printed avocado-shaped pebble with embedded microsensors and a soft, water-resistant outer covering that could be exposed to the same conditions as the actual produce surrounding it during transportation. It enabled researchers to perform condition monitoring to ensure that the produce arrives at its destination in the best condition possible, and that its shelf life can be extended.

Applying the principle of strategic foresight, and the concept of exploring alternative futures by visualising diverse combinations of identified trends and uncertainties, he invited the audience to look ahead at what the country’s road network might look like in the future, and what we should be preparing ourselves for. Despite the disruptive technologies that have characterised the Fourth Industrial Revolution, he predicts that we will probably still be using vehicles for transportation for some time in the future. However, he emphasised the need for foresight in vehicle-pavement interaction to ensure sustainable and healthy transportation practices through continuous and automated monitoring and maintenance. This entails changes and concerns related to the materials used in road pavement construction and the use of smart digital twins as data-driven models to study, manage and analyse a real-world simulation interactively.

He concluded that successful journeys depend on mutual respect between the user and the road. This prevents overstressing and helps maintain smooth road surfaces. Using the analogy of his presentation, this can be interpreted as improved minding and improved mending. However, one should never lose sight of “how to human”: to strive to be a better ancestor through what he calls “transgenerational empathy”. He reminded the audience that it is not just about the data. It is about supporting communities, improving their mobility, and ensuring that they can access essential services through an improved road network, enabling them to live a better life.