Federal motorway 17

	Template: Infobox high-ranking street / Maintenance / DE-A
	Bundesautobahn 17 in Germany
	map
	Basic data
Operator:	Federal Republic of Germany
Start of the street:	Dresden ; ( 51 ° 4 ′ N , 13 ° 36 ′ E )
End of street:	Liebenau ; ( 50 ° 47 ′ N , 13 ° 54 ′ E )
Overall length:	45 km
State :	Saxony
Development condition:	four-lane
	Federal motorway 17 at the Dölzschen tunnel
	Free State of Saxony
	Under construction; In planning; Traffic control system ;

The federal motorway 17 (abbreviation: BAB 17 ) - short form: Autobahn 17 (abbreviation: A 17 ) - leads from Dresden in a southerly direction to the Czech border and has been continuously passable since December 21, 2006. Construction of the A 17 began in 1998. As the D 8 , the route continues on the Czech side to Prague .

Since it crosses the Eastern Ore Mountains in a pan-European corridor ( Europastraße 55 ) at heights of more than 600 meters and is intended to serve regional traffic in the Dresden conurbation on the southern edge of the Elbe valley , the construction of the motorway was very complex and is already close to Dresden due to numerous Tunnels and bridges shaped. The total distance of 45 km cost around 680 million euros , that is 15.25 million euros per kilometer of the motorway.

To underline the European dimension of the Prague - Dresden connection, the A 17 / D 8 is known as Via Porta Bohemica ( Street of the Bohemian Gate ).

course

280 years of traffic history: in the foreground you can see the half-mile column no.10 (1729) on the Alte Dresden-Teplitzer Poststrasse , a few meters behind it is the heavy goods traffic of the 21st century on the A17

The federal motorway 17 runs parallel to a historic Erzgebirge pass . Disregarding the fact that it crosses the Kerbtäler without enormous differences in altitude using modern concrete bridges , it follows the course of the Dresden-Teplitzer Poststraße and the Kulmer Steig immediately after bridging the Müglitz Valley in Dohna. In addition to the effect on regional road traffic in the Dresden conurbation between Pirna and Dresden, this route, the Nollendorfer Pass, was also chosen to be the lowest crossing of the Ore Mountains at around 600 meters above sea level.

The motorway has at least four lanes throughout (plus hard shoulder ) and has a standard cross-section of 29.5 m, on large bridges 29.0 m.

history

Routing in the Dresden metropolitan area

The first plans for the Dresden – Prague connection date from 1938 as "Route 72". In Dresden, both a south-westerly variant similar to today's route and a north-east variant over the Dresdner Heide and Pirna were planned. The latter was decided in 1940, but due to the war there was no more concrete construction work.

Based on the pre-war plans, the connection to Prague was also considered again in the GDR from the end of the 1960s. At the end of the 1970s, a southern route, similar to today's, was decided. This project did not go beyond concrete plans, probably also for cost reasons.

After 1990, proponents argued that construction would become more and more urgent due to the increased truck traffic on federal highway 170 . Following on from the existing plans, various routes west of Dresden were designed, of which a variant that was relatively close to the city was decided. The section from Pirna to the state border was planned further west for reasons of landscape protection, as the original route would have touched the national park region of Saxon Switzerland .

The name A 17 was intended for another motorway in the early 1990s. This federal motorway 17 should lead from Bautzen southeast to Zittau and on to the Czech Republic. There it would have had a connection to the D 35. On this route , the federal highway 178 was realized in sections ( federal highway 178n ). In Zittau, a triangle was planned with the federal motorway 18 to Cottbus, which was also not built . Today's A 17 to Prague should be run as part of the federal motorway 13.

Conflicts over the construction

In the Zschonergrund near Zöllmen there was a permanently inhabited hut village from April 1997 , consisting of wooden huts, construction trailers, barricades and tree huts. The hut village was evacuated on April 21, 1999 by a SEK of the police

After the fall of the Wall, a network of several citizens' initiatives and environmental protection groups (including the Green League ) formed against the construction of the motorway , while the project was driven forward at the urging of business by the Bundestag, the Federal Ministry of Transport and the Saxon cabinet. A city-cutting variant of the A 17 was repeatedly rejected by the Dresden city council because it feared, among other things, unacceptable noise and air pollution. The then Lord Mayor of Dresden Herbert Wagner (CDU) also failed with his veto.

As a result, a citizens' initiative for the construction of the A 17 was founded, which, together with parts of the Dresden CDU city leaders , initiated a referendum for the construction of the A 17. On November 5, 1995, around 50% of the Dresden voters took part in this referendum. Of which approximately voted ² / ₃ for the construction of the city cut version.

As it turned out later, the citizens' initiative for the A 17 received support from the road construction lobby association GSV , which later claimed: “This referendum and the participation of the GSV in its result is the real core of the success that the GSV can claim for itself . "

Protected areas along the route

The highway crosses or touches some areas under the protection of wild fauna and flora habitats directive are and had to check environmental and legal requirements in accordance with environmentally friendly are planned. These areas are

the "FFH area 37E valleys of United and Wilder Weißeritz",
the "FFH area 179 Lockwitzgrund and Wilisch" (compatibility due to a bridge with little structure; see above),
the "FFH area 180 Meuschaer Höhe" (compatibility due to the green bridge over the Meuschaer Höhe landscape tunnel ),
the "FFH area 85E Seidewitztal and Börnersdorfer Bach" (compatibility due to arched bridge without supports in the valley floor),
the "FFH area 181 Bahrebachtal" (compatibility through easy bypassing) and
the "FFH area 42E low mountain range around Oelsen" (compatibility through light surroundings and the least possible contact) directly on the border with the Czech Republic.

and display information about the image

The Osterzgebirge is strongly characterized by the character of the pult plaice and has small protected areas mostly in the valleys, with the Elbe valley in the background

There are further conflicts with the routing of the subsequent D 8 in the Czech Republic. The planned route in the area of the Bohemian Central Uplands leads through a nature reserve .

First construction phase

The first part of the first construction phase runs from the Dresden-West motorway triangle ( A 4 ) to the Dresden-Gorbitz junction ( B 173 ). This 3.6 km long route was built from August 1998, released on October 8, 2001 and cost around 53.6 million euros. The feeder road to Dresden, Coventrystraße (B 173), was expanded to four lanes from March 2007. A bypass for Kesselsdorf on the B 173 was under construction from 2009 to 2011. As a feeder to Freital was State Street postponed 36 and expanded.

The second part of the first construction phase goes from the Dresden-Gorbitz junction (B 173) to Dresden-Südvorstadt ( B 170 ). This 8.8 km route cost around 286 million euros. 87% of the costs were accounted for by the tunnel-bridge-tunnel construction over the Plauenschen Grund and the Weißeritz between Dölzschen ( Dölzschen tunnel ) and Coschütz ( Coschütz tunnel ). A meter of tunnel tube cost around 40,000 euros here. Construction of this part began in the spring of 2000. The Altfranken tunnel is also located on this section of the route . The opening of this second section was postponed from October 2004 to December 22nd, 2004 after a cable fire in the Coschützer tunnel. As early as autumn 2005, extensive repair work was necessary in the tunnels in order to eliminate construction defects.

Second construction phase

The motorway between the junctions Heidenau and Pirna with a view of the Elbe Sandstone Mountains

The first part of the second construction phase goes from the junction (AS) Dresden-Südvorstadt (B 170) to Dresden-Prohlis. The three-kilometer route cost 45 million euros and was approved on October 25, 2004, before the first phase of construction was completely finished. AS Dresden-Prohlis built a new feeder to the then B 172 to relieve Kauscha and Dresden-Nickern from traffic. This bypass leads as S 191 over Goppeln and Rippien to the B 170 in Bannewitz ( Hänichen ).

The remaining section of the second construction phase from the Dresden-Prohlis junction to Pirna is 9.9 kilometers long and was released on July 22, 2005. The construction costs amounted to 113 million euros. On the opening date, only the northern side of the Lockwitztal Bridge was completed. It was released on December 13, 2005 on both sides. A feeder road was built by AS Heidenau, on the one hand to the B 172 and in 2007 on the other hand between Borthen and Röhrsdorf and further towards Wittgensdorf . AS Pirna is located near Dohna , from there the B 172a was built with four lanes to Pirna.

Third construction phase

It is 19.3 kilometers from the Pirna junction to the Czech border. Construction officially began on December 8, 2004, with work on the bridges having been in progress since spring 2004. It cost about 154 million euros. On December 21, 2006 the motorway from Dresden to the border and on the Czech side the continuation as D 8 to Ústí nad Labem was opened to traffic.

Buildings

Dölzschen tunnel

Old Franconia tunnel

The Altfranken landscape tunnel is located at Dresden- Altfranken . There the motorway runs under the castle park (" Luckner Park"). The biotope connection was created between 2000 and 2004 using an open construction method . At a length of 345 m, the underpass has two tubes with two lanes to the east and three to the west.

Dolzschen tunnel

The Dölzschen tunnel consists of two tubes and crosses under the Dresden district of Dölzschen over a length of 1070 m. As it rises slightly to the west, the northern carriageway has three lanes, but has no hard shoulder. The tunnel was built using the “ New Austrian Tunneling Method ”.

Coschütz tunnel

The Coschützer Tunnel is the longest tunnel on the A 17 and crosses under the Dresden district of Coschütz . The two tubes of the tunnel, each with two lanes and one hard shoulder, are 2332 m long. It was also built according to the "New Austrian Tunneling Method". The Coschütz tunnel is connected to the Dölzschen tunnel via the Weißeritztal bridge in Plauenschen Grund .

Lockwitztal Bridge

Lockwitztal Bridge on the southern outskirts of Dresden

The Lockwitztalbrücke is the tallest and longest bridge structure on the A17. It is 723 meters long and spans the valley floor at a height of up to 64 meters on the southern outskirts of Dresden. The bridge has spans of up to 125 meters and is characterized by a new type of construction with arched diagonal struts made of reinforced concrete. This enabled the number of pillars to be limited to eight out of consideration for a fauna and flora habitat in the valley. In addition, the bridge has a curve radius of 2500 meters; the center of the circle is north of the bridge. It was completed in December 2005.

Seidewitztal Bridge

The Seidewitztalbrücke spans the valley of the same name near Pirna over a length of 568 meters. With a span of 154 meters it is the largest arch bridge in Saxony and is up to 55 meters above ground. The massive parabolic arch was erected in a guyed cantilever . The bridge was completed in 2006.

Border crossing

The border crossing point on the 17 motorway to the Czech Republic was called Breitenau - Krásný Les / Schönwald . It was about 4.7 km from the actual border on the German side near Börnersdorf-Breitenau and was very simply equipped from the start, as it was already foreseeable during construction that the identity checks would be carried out by the Czech Republic joining the Schengen Agreement on December 21 2007 - exactly one year after the opening of the border crossing - would disappear. The site of the border crossing point was then converted into a parking lot. In addition, a German-Czech police center was opened in Petrovice / Peterswald.

In the immediate vicinity of the border is the 282-meter-long Nasenbachtal bridge , which is directly adjacent to the 300-meter-long Harthe landscape tunnel . The directly following, 412 meter long border bridge over the Schönwalder Bach was built by the Czech Republic and crosses the German-Czech border. On the Czech side, on the slope of the 723-meter-high Špičák ( Saddle Mountain ), the road reaches the highest point of the motorway connection at around 650 meters above sea level . Shortly after the beginning of the Panenská tunnel, a few meters behind the Petrovice junction , the Ore Mountains ridge watershed , a subordinate watershed between the catchment areas of the waters that flow into the Elbe in Bohemia and Saxony , is crossed.

literature

BMVBS (ed.): New construction of the A17 / D8 Dresden-Prague. Documentation 2006. Berlin 2006. PDF
Redaktions- und Verlagsgesellschaft Freital-Pirna (ed.): Motorway A 17 Dresden - Prague. Chronicle of a major project. Freital 2007, ISBN 3-936642-07-9
Karl-Heinz Reintjes: The arched bridges of the A 17 - design and execution . In: Bautechnik 82 (2005), issue 11.

Web links

Commons : Bundesautobahn 17 - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

↑ DEGES documentation 2006 "New construction of the A 17 / D 8 Dresden Prague"
^ Sächsische Zeitung of October 8, 1999
↑ Quoted from Rainer Müller: This is how the road construction lobby works. (PDF; 1.1 MB) In: New Paths, Edition 3/2007. Verkehrsclub Deutschland , p. 5 , accessed on April 9, 2019 .
↑ New State Road 191 opened to traffic. Saxon State Ministry for Economic Affairs, Labor and Transport , October 7, 2013, accessed on March 4, 2015 .

[1] DEGES documentation 2006 "New construction of the A 17 / D 8 Dresden Prague"

[2] Sächsische Zeitung of October 8, 1999

[3] Quoted from Rainer Müller: This is how the road construction lobby works. (PDF; 1.1 MB) In: New Paths, Edition 3/2007. Verkehrsclub Deutschland , p. 5 , accessed on April 9, 2019 .

[4] New State Road 191 opened to traffic. Saxon State Ministry for Economic Affairs, Labor and Transport , October 7, 2013, accessed on March 4, 2015 .