The Autobahn (IPA: [ˈaʊtoˌbaːn] ; German pl. Autobahnen, pronounced [ˈaʊtoˌbaːnən] ) is the federal controlled-access highway system in Germany. The official term is Bundesautobahn (abbreviated BAB), which translates as 'federal motorway'. The literal meaning of the word Bundesautobahn is 'Federal Auto(mobile) 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 (Richtgeschwindigkeit) of 130 kilometres per hour (81 mph) 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 (which mandatory auto insurance has to cover); 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. In 2006, measurements from the German state of Brandenburg showed average speeds of 142 km/h (88 mph) 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 (Bundesstraße), state (Landesstraße), district, and municipal level but are not part of the Autobahn network and are officially referred to as Kraftfahrstraße (with rare exceptions, like A 995 Munich-Giesing–Brunntal until 2018). These highways are considered autobahnähnlich (autobahn-like) and are sometimes colloquially called Gelbe Autobahn (yellow autobahn) because most of them are Bundesstraßen (federal highways) with yellow signs. Some controlled-access highways are classified as "Bundesautobahn" in spite of not meeting the autobahn construction standard (for example, the A 62 near Pirmasens).
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 60 km/h (37 mph). 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 60 centimetres (24 in) in width, constructed of varying materials; right-hand shoulders on many autobahns were later retrofitted to 120 centimetres (47 in) in width when it was realized cars needed the additional 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 160 km/h (99 mph) 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 150 km/h (93 mph) on curves.
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Reference material for this entry is drawn from the open encyclopedic record, including Wikipedia , available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license. Images are credited individually beside each photo.
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 (for example A 8). The main autobahns going all across Germany have a single-digit number. Shorter autobahns that are of regional importance (e.g. connecting two major cities or regions within Germany) have a double-digit number (e.g. A 24, connecting Berlin and Hamburg). The system is as follows:
A 10 to A 19 are in eastern Germany (Berlin, Saxony-Anhalt, parts of Saxony and Brandenburg)
A 20 to A 29 are in northern and northeastern Germany
A 30 to A 39 are in Lower Saxony (northwestern Germany) 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 (southern) Bavaria
A 98 is in Baden-Württemberg
There are also some very short autobahns built just for local traffic (e.g. ring roads or the A 555 from Cologne to Bonn) that usually have three digits for numbering. The first digit used is similar to the system above, depending on the region.
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 (lower numbers) to south (higher numbers).
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 (Lord Mayor of Cologne and future Chancellor of West Germany) 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 ("motor vehicle road") 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 (and thereby removed from the unemployment registry).
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 432 kilometres per hour (268 mph) 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 3,800 km (2,400 mi) out of a planned 20,000 km (12,000 mi) 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.
West Germany: 1949–1990
In West Germany (FRG), most existing autobahns were repaired soon after the war. During the 1950s, the West German government restarted the construction program. It invested in new sections and in improvements to older ones. Finishing the incomplete sections took longer, with some stretches opened to traffic by the 1980s. Some sections cut by the Iron Curtain in 1945 were only completed after German reunification in 1990. Others were never completed, as more advantageous routes were found. An example is Strecke 46 between Bad Brückenau and Gemünden am Main on the Fulda-Würzburg route, which was replaced by A7.
East Germany: 1949–1990
In 1956, the speed limit was set to 100 kilometres per hour (62 mph) in the new version of the Rules of the Road (Straßenverkehrsordnung), which adopted a lot of rules that corresponded with the international standards of the time. The reasons for this speed limit are unknown. Oftentimes it is argued that the roads were in a poor state, however, there is no proof that the road conditions were a relevant factor in introducing the speed limit, especially since the roads were not much used in the first 20 years after the Second World War and the majority of the road network was based on the Reichsautobahn of Nazi-Germany just like in West Germany, and thus were in a good state. Speed limit violations on the autobahns of the GDR were rare because most cars didn’t have the engine power to go much faster than the set limit. For example, the most common car of the GDR, the Trabant, could reach a maximum of only 110 kilometres per hour (68 mph).
Reunification: 1990–present day
The last 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) of the remaining original Reichsautobahn, a section of A 11 northeast of Berlin near Gartz built in 1936—the westernmost remainder of the never-finished Berlinka— was scheduled for replacement around 2015. Roadway condition is described as "deplorable"; the 25 metres (82 ft)-long concrete slabs, too long for proper expansion, are cracking under the weight of the traffic as well as the weather.
German-built Reichsautobahnen in other countries
The first autobahn in Austria was the West Autobahn from Wals near Salzburg to Vienna. Building started by command of Adolf Hitler shortly after the Anschluss in 1938. It extended the Reichsautobahn 26 from Munich (the present-day A 8), however only 16.8 km (10.4 mi) including the branch-off of the planned Tauern Autobahn was opened to the public on 13 September 1941. Construction works discontinued the next year and were not resumed until 1955.
There are sections of the former German Reichsautobahn system in the former eastern territories of Germany, i.e. East Prussia, Farther Pomerania, and Silesia; these territories became parts of Poland and the Soviet Union with the implementation of the Oder–Neisse line after World War II. Parts of the planned autobahn from Berlin to Königsberg (the Berlinka) were completed as far as Stettin (Szczecin) on 27 September 1936. After the war, they were incorporated as the A6 autostrada of the Polish motorway network. A single-carriageway section of the Berlinka east of the former "Polish Corridor" and the Free City of Danzig opened in 1938; today it forms the Polish S22 expressway from Elbląg (Elbing) to the border with the Russian Kaliningrad Oblast, where it is continued by the R516 regional road. Also on 27 September 1936, a section from Breslau (Wrocław) to Liegnitz (Legnica) in Silesia was inaugurated, which today is part of the Polish A4 autostrada, followed by the (single vehicle) Reichsautobahn 9 from Bunzlau (Bolesławiec) to Sagan (Żagań) the next year, today part of the Polish A18 autostrada.
After the German occupation of Czechoslovakia, plans for a motorway connecting Breslau with Vienna via Brno (Brünn) in the "Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia" were carried out from 1939 until construction works discontinued in 1942. A section of the former Strecke 88 near Brno is today part of the D52 motorway of the Czech Republic. Also, there is the isolated and abandoned twin-carriageway Borovsko Bridge southeast of Prague, on which construction started in July 1939 and halted after the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich by former Czechoslovak army soldiers at the end of May 1942.
Network size
As of 2021, Germany's autobahn network has a total length of about 13,192 kilometres (8,197 mi). Longer similar systems can be found in the United States (77,960 kilometres or 48,440 miles) and in China (149,600 kilometres or 93,000 miles). However both the U.S. and China have an area nearly 30 times bigger than Germany, which demonstrates the high density of Germany's highway system..
Most sections of Germany's autobahns have two or three, sometimes four lanes in each direction in addition to an emergency lane (hard shoulder). A few sections have only two lanes in each direction without emergency lanes, and short slip-roads and ramps. Since 2009 Germany has embarked on a massive widening and rehabilitation project which aims to increase the number of lanes on many of its major arterial roads of the highway network, such as the A 5 in the southwest and A 8 going east–west.
The motorway density in Germany is 36 kilometers per thousand square kilometer in 2016, close to that of the smaller countries nearby (Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Slovenia).
Facilities
Emergency telephones
About 17,000 emergency telephones are distributed at regular intervals all along the autobahn network, with triangular stickers on the armco barriers pointing the way to the nearest one. Despite the increasing use of mobile phones, there are still about 150 calls made each day on average (after some 700 in 2013). This still equals four calls per kilometre each year. The location of the caller is automatically sent to the operator.
Parking, rest areas, and truck stops
For breaks during longer journeys, parking sites, rest areas, and truck stops are distributed over the complete Autobahn network. Parking on the autobahn is prohibited in the strictest terms outside these designated areas. There is a distinction between "managed" and "unmanaged" rest areas. (German: bewirtschaftet / unbewirtschaftet).
Unmanaged rest areas are basically only parking spaces, sometimes with toilets. They form a part of the German highway system; the plots of land are federal property. Autobahn exits leading to such parking areas are marked at least 200 metres (660 ft) (mostly 500 metres (1,600 ft)) in advance with a blue sign with the white letter "P". They are usually found every few kilometres. Some of them bear local or historic names.
A managed rest area (German: Autobahnraststätte or Raststätte (German: [ˈʁastˌʃtɛtə] ) for short) usually also includes a filling station, charging station, lavatories, toilets, and baby changes. Most rest areas also have restaurants, shops, public telephones, Internet access, and a playground. Some have hotels. Mandated every 50 kilometres (31 mi) or so, rest areas are usually open all night.
Both kinds of rest areas are directly on the autobahn, with their own exits, and any service roads connecting them to the rest of the road network are usually closed to general traffic. Apart from rare exceptions, the autobahn must not be left nor entered at rest areas.
Truck stops (German: Autohof (German: [ˈaʊ̯toˌhoːf] ), plural Autohöfe (German: [ˈaʊ̯toˌhøːfə] )) are large filling stations located at general exits, usually at a small distance from the autobahn, combined with fast food facilities and/or restaurants, but have no ramps of their own. They mostly sell fuel at normal price level while the Raststätten fuel prices are significantly higher.
Rest areas and truck stops are marked several times as motorists approach, starting several kilometres in advance, and include large signs that often include icons announcing what kinds of facilities travellers can expect, such as hotels, filling stations, rest areas, etc.
Speed limits
Germany's autobahns are famous for being among the few public roads in the world without blanket speed limits for cars and motorcycles. As such, they are important German cultural identifiers, "often mentioned in hushed, reverential tones by motoring enthusiasts and looked at with a mix of awe and terror by outsiders." Some speed limits are implemented on different autobahns.
Certain limits are imposed on some classes of vehicles:
Additionally, speed limits are posted at most on- and off-ramps and interchanges and other danger points like sections under construction or in need of repair.
