Ice cold

Designer Daan Roosegaarde and the mega European construction company Heijmans Infrastructure recently revealed plans for a "smart highway" through a fascinating pictorial of sustainable and interactive road concepts.

While several of the ideas in this gallery need years of further honing before they're implemented, the dynamic paint, shown above, should arrive in the Netherlands around mid-2013. The proposed smart paint changes appearance based on the temperature. In this example, we see a series of ice crystals upon the road that cautiously indicate to the driver that it's cold and slippery out.