Reference
The NSV survey, and what recorded video can do with it
A network survey vehicle (NSV) records a highway’s inventory and condition with lasers, positioning and video. This note sets out what MoRTH’s circulars require of the survey, and which part of it recorded video can produce on its own — and which it cannot.
NHAI’s NSV deployment, announced October 2025
- National Highways
- 20,933 km
- States
- 23
The requirement
What MoRTH asks the survey to record
Each line below is the circular’s requirement, paraphrased only where its list was long; the source is linked beside it.
- Inventory of the road
- GPS coordinates, pavement type and width, terrain, land use, shoulders, drains, median, wayside amenities, crash barriers and signage — both sides of the road, geo-tagged with images.
- MoRTH, 13 November 2019
- Condition of the road, per lane
- Roughness, rutting, and distresses — cracking, potholes, bleeding, surface failure — recorded for each lane and geo-tagged.
- MoRTH, 13 November 2019
- When
- Before work starts, before the provisional or final completion certificate, and every six months after completion.
- MoRTH, 13 November 2019
- Where the data goes
- Into the Road Asset Management System (RAMS) for every National Highway, whichever agency it is entrusted to; pavement strength by falling weight deflectometer at least once a year after completion.
- MoRTH, 4 February 2021
- Who now checks it
- A centralised NSV cell runs independent surveys of completed works. Its results are compared with the AE’s or IE’s NSV report and “shall form the reference for the action against AE / IE”.
- MoRTH, 21 May 2026
The instrument
What an NSV measures, and with what
CSIR-CRRI lists what its own NSV collects at highway speed. Most of the condition channels are laser measurements; two are video. That line decides what can be done afterwards with the footage alone.
Source: CSIR-CRRI, accessed 10 October 2026.
| Channel | Sensor | From video alone |
|---|---|---|
| Roughness (IRI) | Longitudinal laser profile | No |
| Rut depth | Transverse laser profile | No |
| Texture (mean profile depth) | Laser | No |
| Road assets and furniture | Video imaging | Yes |
| Surface distresses | Video imaging | Yes |
The video channel
What recorded video can give you, and what it cannot
Playcraft Distress works on forward-facing dashcam or phone footage from a mount calibrated at setup. More distress classes, and chainage read from an NSV’s banner, we build on demand.
From the footage
- Detect alligator cracking and potholes per pixel, and measure each defect’s length, width and area in metres once the camera mount is calibrated.
- Read GPS, date and camera tilt from the overlay burnt into the video, and measure distance along the road from the footage itself.
- Keep one record per physical defect, however many frames it appears in.
- Hand over a CSV inventory, a segment summary, a linear-plot PDF report and an annotated video.
Not from the footage
- Roughness, rut depth or texture depth — those are laser measurements, and a camera does not recover them.
- Skid resistance — friction testing, with no imaging path to it.
- Structural capacity — the falling weight deflectometer’s job.
- Survey-grade position on its own — chainage is only as good as the GPS and distance data burnt into the footage.
Output formats ask for more than detections. NHIDCL’s NSV output format, for example, rates each lane 1 to 5 for cracking, potholes, ravelling and the rest (NHIDCL, 4 December 2024). Turning a defect inventory into ratings like those is a scoring step we build on demand to the format you report in — it is not a shipped feature, and we will not describe it as one.
Sources
The documents behind this note
Read and quoted from the documents themselves. Where a circular has since been superseded, the later one is cited for the current position.
- Policy guidelines on surveying with Network Survey Vehicle (NSV)MoRTH · RW/NH-33044/32/2019-S&R (P&B) · 13 November 2019
- Integration of NSV/FWD survey data with RAMS for all NHsMoRTH · RW/G-23012/01/2019-W&A (Part-IV) · 4 February 2021
- Policy guidelines on surveying with NSV (centralised NSV surveys)MoRTH · RW/G-23012/01/2019-W&A (Part-IV) · 21 May 2026
- NHAI to deploy Network Survey Vehicles across the country for over 20,000 km of National HighwaysNHAI · Press release · 22 October 2025
- Network Survey VehicleCSIR-CRRI · Institute page · accessed 10 October 2026
- EOI for NSV survey of NH-10 Sevoke–Rangpo, Annexure I “Output format from Network Survey Vehicle”NHIDCL · NHIDCL/PMU-Siliguri/Survey/2024 · 4 December 2024
Next step
Send us 15 minutes of survey footage
- Measured defect inventory as CSV
- Annotated video and linear-plot PDF report
- A note on calibration: what your camera mount needs for sizes in metres
No obligation. You keep the output. Back within a working day.