Road Design Standards
The following design standards should be applied to Euroroutes unless there are exceptional circumstances (such as mountain passes etc.):
- Built-up areas shall be by-passed if they constitute a hindrance or a danger.
- The roads should preferably be motorways or express roads (unless traffic density is low so that there is no congestion on an ordinary road).
- They should be homogeneous and be designed for at least 80 km/h (very exceptionally 60 km/h). Motorways for at least 100 km/h.
- Gradients should not exceed 8% on roads designed for 60 km/h, decreasing to 4% on roads designed for 120 km/h traffic.
- The radius of curved sections of road should be a minimum of 120 m on roads designed for 60 km/h rising to 1000 m on roads designed for 140 km/h.
- "Stopping distance visibility" should be at least 70 m on roads designed for 60 km/h, rising to 300 m on roads designed for 140 km/h.
- Lane width should be at least 3.5 m on straight sections of road. This guarantees adequate clearance for any vehicle having a superstructure of width 2.55 m which is the maximum specified in EU directive 96/53/EC., and 2.6 m specified by some countries.
- The shoulder is recommended to be at least 2.5 m on ordinary roads and 3.25 m on motorways.
- Central reservations should be at least 3 m unless there is a barrier between the two carriageways.
- Overhead clearance should be not less than 4.5 m.
- Railway intersections should be at different levels.
These requirements are meant to be followed for road construction. When new E-roads have been added these requirements have not been followed stringently. For example the E 45 in Sweden, added in 2006, has long parts with 6 m (20 ft) width or the E 22 in eastern Europe forcing drivers to slow down to 30 km/h by taking the route through villages. In Norway, parts of the E 10 are 5 m (16 ft) wide and in Central Asia some gravel roads have even been included.
Read more about this topic: International E-road Network
Famous quotes containing the words road, design and/or standards:
“A route differs from a road not only because it is solely intended for vehicles, but also because it is merely a line that connects one point with another. A route has no meaning in itself; its meaning derives entirely from the two points that it connects. A road is a tribute to space. Every stretch of road has meaning in itself and invites us to stop. A route is the triumphant devaluation of space, which thanks to it has been reduced to a mere obstacle to human movement and a waste of time.”
—Milan Kundera (b. 1929)
“A good scientist is a person with original ideas. A good engineer is a person who makes a design that works with as few original ideas as possible. There are no prima donnas in engineering.”
—Freeman Dyson (b. 1923)
“Our ego ideal is precious to us because it repairs a loss of our earlier childhood, the loss of our image of self as perfect and whole, the loss of a major portion of our infantile, limitless, aint-I-wonderful narcissism which we had to give up in the face of compelling reality. Modified and reshaped into ethical goals and moral standards and a vision of what at our finest we might be, our dream of perfection lives onour lost narcissism lives onin our ego ideal.”
—Judith Viorst (20th century)