Autobahn
The Autobahn is the federal controlled-access highway system in Germany. The official term is Bundesautobahn, which translates as 'federal motorway'. The literal meaning of the word Bundesautobahn is 'Federal Auto Track'.
Much of the system has no speed limit for some classes of vehicles. However, limits are posted and enforced in areas that are urbanised, substandard, prone to collisions, or under construction. On speed-unrestricted stretches, an advisory speed limit of applies. While driving faster is not illegal in the absence of a speed limit, it can cause an increased liability in the case of a collision ; courts have ruled that an "ideal driver" who is exempt from absolute liability for "inevitable" tort under the law would not exceed the advisory speed limit.
A 2017 report by the Federal Road Research Institute reported that in 2015, 70.4% of the Autobahn network had only the advisory speed limit, 6.2% had temporary speed limits due to weather or traffic conditions, and 23.4% had permanent speed limits. Measurements from the German state of Brandenburg in 2006 showed average speeds of on a 6-lane section of Autobahn in free-flowing conditions.
Names
Only federally built controlled-access highways with certain construction standards including at least two lanes per direction are called Bundesautobahn. They have their own white-on-blue signs and numbering system. In the 1930s, when construction began on the system, the official name was Reichsautobahn. Various other controlled-access highways exist on the federal, state, district, and municipal level but are not part of the Autobahn network and are officially referred to as Kraftfahrstraße. These highways are considered autobahnähnlich and are sometimes colloquially called Gelbe Autobahn because most of them are Bundesstraßen with yellow signs. Some controlled-access highways are classified as "Bundesautobahn" in spite of not meeting the autobahn construction standard.Similar to some other German words, the term autobahn when used in English is usually understood to refer specifically to the national highway system of Germany, whereas in German the word autobahn is applied to any controlled highway in any country. For this reason in German, the more specific term Bundesautobahn is strongly preferred when the intent is to make specific reference to Germany's Autobahn network.
Construction
Similar to high-speed motorways in other countries, autobahns have multiple lanes of traffic in each direction, separated by a central barrier with grade-separated junctions and access restricted to motor vehicles with a top speed greater than. Nearly all exits are to the right; rare left-hand exits result from incomplete interchanges where the "straight-on" leads into the exit. The earliest motorways were flanked by shoulders about in width, constructed of varying materials; right-hand shoulders on many autobahns were later retrofitted to in width when it was realized cars needed the additional space to pull off the autobahn safely. In the postwar years, a thicker asphaltic concrete cross-section with fully paved hard shoulders came into general use. The top design speed was approximately in flat country but lower design speeds were used in hilly or mountainous terrain. A flat-country autobahn that was constructed to meet standards during the Nazi period could support speeds of up to on curves.Numbering system
The current autobahn numbering system in use in Germany was introduced in 1974. All autobahns are named by using the capital letter A, which simply stands for "Autobahn" followed by a blank and a number. The main autobahns going all across Germany have a single-digit number. Shorter autobahns that are of regional importance have a double-digit number. The system is as follows:- A 10 to A 19 are in eastern Germany
- A 20 to A 29 are in northern and northeastern Germany
- A 30 to A 39 are in Lower Saxony and Thuringia
- A 40 to A 49 are in the Rhine-Ruhr to Frankfurt Rhine-Main
- A 52 to A 59 are in the Lower Rhine region to Cologne
- A 60 to A 67 are in Rhineland-Palatinate, Saarland, Hesse and northern Baden-Württemberg
- A 70 to A 73 are in Thuringia, northern Bavaria and parts of Saxony
- A 81 is in Baden-Württemberg
- A 90 to A 99 are in Bavaria
- A 98 is in Baden-Württemberg
East–west routes are even-numbered, north–south routes are odd-numbered. The north–south autobahns are generally numbered from west to east; that is to say, the more easterly roads are given higher numbers. Similarly, the east–west routes are numbered from north to south.
History
Weimar Republic: 1918-1933
The idea for the construction of the autobahn was first conceived in the mid-1920s during the days of the Weimar Republic, but the construction was slow, and most projected sections did not progress much beyond the planning stage due to economic problems and a lack of political support. One project was the private initiative HaFraBa which planned a "car-only road" crossing Germany from Hamburg in the north via central Frankfurt am Main to Basel in Switzerland. Parts of the HaFraBa were completed in the late 1930s and early 1940s, but construction eventually was halted by World War II. The first public road of this kind was completed in 1932 between Cologne and Bonn and opened by Konrad Adenauer on 6 August 1932. Today, that road is the Bundesautobahn 555. This road was not yet called Autobahn and lacked a centre median like modern motorways, but instead was termed a Kraftfahrstraße with two lanes each direction without intersections, pedestrians, bicycles, or animal-powered transportation.Third Reich: 1933-1945
Just days after the 1933 Nazi takeover, Adolf Hitler enthusiastically embraced an ambitious autobahn construction project, appointing Fritz Todt, the Inspector General of German Road Construction, to lead it. By 1936, 130,000 workers were directly employed in construction, as well as an additional 270,000 in the supply chain for construction equipment, steel, concrete, signage, maintenance equipment, etc. In rural areas, new camps to house the workers were built near construction sites. The job creation program aspect was not especially important because full employment was almost reached by 1936. However, according to one source autobahn workers were often conscripted through the compulsory Reich Labor Service.The autobahns were not primarily intended as major infrastructure improvement of special value to the military as sometimes stated. Their military value was limited as all large-scale military transportation in Germany was done by train to save fuel. The propaganda ministry turned the construction of the autobahns into a major media event that attracted international attention.
The autobahns formed the first limited-access, high-speed road network in the world, with the first section from Frankfurt am Main to Darmstadt opening in 1935. This straight section was used for high-speed record attempts by the Grand Prix racing teams of Mercedes-Benz and Auto Union until a fatal crash involving popular German race driver Bernd Rosemeyer in early 1938. The world record of set by Rudolf Caracciola on this stretch just prior to the crash remains one of the highest speeds ever achieved on a public motorway. In the 1930s, a ten-kilometre stretch of what is today Bundesautobahn 9 just south of Dessau—called the Dessauer Rennstrecke—had bridges with no piers and was designed for cars like the Mercedes-Benz T80 to attempt to make land speed records. The T80 was to make a record attempt in January 1940, but plans were abandoned after the outbreak of World War II in Europe in September 1939.
World War II: 1939-1945
During World War II, many of Germany's workers were required for various war production tasks. Therefore, construction work on the autobahn system increasingly relied on forced workers and concentration camp inmates, and working conditions were very poor. As of 1942, when the war turned against the Third Reich, only out of a planned of autobahn had been completed.Meanwhile, the median strips of some autobahns were paved over to allow their conversion into auxiliary airstrips. Aircraft were either stashed in numerous tunnels or camouflaged in nearby woods. However, for the most part during the war, the autobahns were not militarily significant. Motor vehicles, such as trucks, could not carry goods or troops as quickly or in as much bulk and in the same numbers as trains could, and the autobahns could not be used by tanks as their weight and caterpillar tracks damaged the road surface. The general shortage of petrol in Germany during much of the war, as well as the low number of trucks and motor vehicles needed for direct support of military operations, further decreased the autobahn's significance. As a result, most military and economic freight was carried by rail. After the war, numerous sections of the autobahns were in bad shape, severely damaged by heavy Allied bombing and military demolition. Furthermore, thousands of kilometres of autobahns remained unfinished, their construction brought to a halt by 1943 due to the increasing demands of the war effort.