Cologne-West motorway junction

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Template: Infobox Autobahnkreuz / Maintenance / DE-A
Cologne-West motorway junction
A1 A4 E31 E40
map
Overview map of the Cologne-West motorway junction
location
Country: Germany
State : North Rhine-Westphalia
Coordinates: 50 ° 55 '33 "  N , 6 ° 50' 43"  E Coordinates: 50 ° 55 '33 "  N , 6 ° 50' 43"  E
Height: 65  m above sea level NN
Basic data
Design type: Shamrock
Bridges: 3 (motorway)
Construction year: 1963
Last modification: 2012-2017

The Köln-West motorway junction (abbreviation: AK Köln-West ; short form: Kreuz Köln-West ) is a motorway junction on the A 1 and A 4 federal motorways in the west of Cologne , right on the city limits of Frechen between the Cologne districts of Weiden , Junkersdorf and Marsdorf and the Frechen “Europark industrial area”.

The junction located in the southwest of the Cologne motorway ring is an important and heavily frequented traffic junction on the east-west connection between Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany.

history

The Cologne-West junction was built in the early 1960s in the form of a “clover leaf” as a connection between the A 4 and the northern part of the A 1. It became a real motorway junction from 1971 onwards with the construction of the section of the A 1 heading south, known as the Eifel motorway .

From March 2001 to March 2003 the cross was rebuilt. The original shape was retained, but the intertwining routes between the heavily used ramps have largely been straightened out. The most noticeable change is the separate routing of the connecting ramp for the Aachen – Dortmund route below the A 1, which means that there is no longer any connection with the cross-corner traffic from Dortmund towards Olpe (A 4) and Frankfurt (A 3). For this purpose, two additional bridges had to be built.

State of development

The A 4 is fully developed with six lanes up to the area of ​​the motorway junction, the A 1 continues south with four lanes. Six lanes north since autumn 2015.

The Cologne-West junction was fundamentally rebuilt by 2003. The previous cloverleaf shape was broken up by creating additional connecting curves (for example, a direct connection from the A 4 from Aachen to the A 1 towards Dortmund). The cross has been rebuilt even further since 2012. After a construction stoppage due to award complaints, construction work was resumed in December 2014. Extensive unbundling of traffic flows was carried out, which is also more complicated because of the Frechen junction immediately to the south - located on the A1 - and the commercial areas there (with high truck volumes). As a final measure, an additional bridge was built for traffic from the A 4 coming from Cologne to the A 1 towards Koblenz. The renovation was completed in the last quarter of 2017. In the south, the Frechen junction is integrated into the A 1 at the motorway junction and thus partially divides the entry and exit areas. To the west, the Frechen-Nord (9a) semi-junction was created on the A 4 , which only creates a connection in the direction of Aachen and thus picks up traffic from Frechen and the Cologne districts of Weiden and Lövenich in this direction instead of routing it across the cross. Since its completion, there have been repeated calls for the exit to be upgraded to a full connection point. This project is now part of a planned package of measures.

traffic

Only light traffic on Sundays - the Köln-West motorway junction

The cross is one of the busiest in Germany. The Aachen – Dortmund connection ramp alone is used by around 15,000 vehicles per day (as of 2010), and the Dortmund – Olpe / Frankfurt connection ramp is even used by 20,000 vehicles per day (as of 2010).

From To Average
daily traffic volume		 Share of
heavy goods traffic
2005 2010 2015 2005 2010 2015
AS Köln-Lövenich (A 1) AK Cologne-West 117,000 115,500 126,200 no data 12.1% 10.0%
AK Cologne-West AS Frechen (A 1) 090,000 083,000 044,100 no data 12.1% 11.0%
AS Frechen-Nord (A 4) AK Cologne-West 076,700 075,100 084,800 13.5% 14.1% 14.3%
AK Cologne-West AS Köln-Klettenberg (A 4) 104,800 104,300 117,900 11.7% 11.6% 13.7%

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Historical information at "autobahn online"
  2. ↑ Development of the German motorway network
  3. ^ Shell road map from 1958
  4. ^ ADAC travel card 1966
  5. ^ ADAC travel card 1972
  6. ↑ a b Straßen.NRW report on the reconstruction of the Cologne-West junction ( Memento of the original from May 12, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / strassen.nrw.de
  7. ^ Reconstruction of the Cologne-West motorway junction. Landesbetrieb Straßenbau NRW , accessed on September 11, 2016 (information on the expansion status and planning of the Cologne-West motorway junction).
  8. ↑ Motorway junction Cologne-West "Überflieger" - bridge construction stopped traffic. In: Kölnische Rundschau . March 27, 2017, accessed on May 13, 2017 (including a beautiful current aerial photo of the Cologne-West intersection).
  9. ↑ © 2016 A4 - Planning Before the World Cup it was faster back then (Kölnische Rundschau)
  10. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original from October 12, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Press release NRW @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.pressemeldung-nrw.de
  11. ↑ Information on the development status and planning of the Cologne motorway ring , Landesbetrieb Straßenbau NRW (accessed: September 11, 2016)
  12. ↑ Manual road traffic census 2005. (PDF) Results on federal motorways. BASt Statistics, 2005, accessed on May 4, 2020 .
  13. ↑ Manual road traffic census 2010. (PDF) Results on federal motorways. BASt Statistics, 2010, accessed on May 4, 2020 .
  14. ↑ Manual road traffic census 2015. (PDF) Results on federal motorways. BASt Statistics, 2015, accessed on July 15, 2017 .
  15. ↑ Note: Why the absolute number of journeys was significantly lower compared to the 2010 census (2010: 83,000) can only be speculated here. It is mainly due to the extensive renovation work at the Cologne-West junction and the expansion of the Lövenich enclosure (directly following the junction on the A1 northbound), which led to considerable traffic obstructions and thus caused road users to look for alternative routes. That traffic has increased overall is clearly shown by the increases in the other directions of travel compared to the 2010 census [whereby these increases, at least in the area of ​​heavy goods traffic, are partly due to the fact that the Leverkusen Rhine Bridge on the A1 (northern part of Cologne Autobahn ring) is closed to traffic over 3.5 tons due to its considerable dilapidation and this traffic must therefore seek the detour around Cologne via the A3 and A4].