That part of the article confused the heck out of me. What they're describing here isn't even new. It's actually a step back to the days before satellite-based global positioning technology replaced fiber-optic infrastructure as the preferred mode of communication for these "next generation" road/vehicle systems.
I have long thought that Google’s self driving car experiment has been a similar step back.
Why?
Well, before a Google self driving car makes a trip, a fleet of cars drive the route and make LIDAR scans, and a squad of people process the data...ultimately creating a 3 dimensional map, which goes in the Google car. This is how the Google car knows to expect a stop sign, or traffic signal (it does not make that recognition real time).
That 3-D map is no different than the 1960’s ‘circuits under the pavement’ concept...just a little more elaborate ‘track’ to keep the car on.