Highways in New South Wales

Location of New South Wales

Map of the highways of New South Wales

The current system of highways of New South Wales ( Australia ) was established in August 1928, when the Country Roads Board , the predecessor of the Department of Main Roads and the Roads and Traffic Authority replaced the 1924 resulting classification of the main roads and a new system is still in use today. A full list of all major roads was published by the New South Wales Government on August 17, 1928. After that, the highways have a different number for administrative purposes than the street number with which the highway is signposted, for example the Great Western Highway has the number 5 in the administration, it is signposted as National Route 32 .

history

While highways in many other countries typically have a number, highways in Australia, including New South Wales, are mostly known by a specific name. The namesake are often explorers from the 19th century, important politicians or geographical regions. National Highway 1 is an exception . It is one of the most famous highways and leads a total of 24,000 km along the coast around the entire continent. In addition, the National Highway 31, also Hume Highway, is relatively known by its number.

The top tier of the highways in Australia are the federally funded National Highways . They connect the capitals with each other. National highways in New South Wales are, for example, the Hume Highway between Sydney and Melbourne , the New England Highway between Newcastle and Brisbane , the Newell Highway from Brisbane to Melbourne or the Federal and Barton Highway , which connect Canberra with the Hume Highway.

numbering

In New South Wales, National Route numbers have been issued for highways since 1955 . The highways under the administration of the state of New South Wales are known as National Routes and State Routes . The road numbering plaque for National Routes consists of a pentagonal shield with a black and white background, the shape of which is based on the Australian coat of arms. The same shape is used for the National Highways, but in green and gold and with the lettering National on the upper edge of the sign.

In addition to the numbering system for the National Routes, the so-called Ring Roads were introduced in 1964 . They ran circularly in increasing radii around Sydney and were numbered 1, 3 and 5. Although the designation has not been valid since 1974, the old signs for Ring Road 3 remained until the 1980s and those for Ring Road 1 until the Received 1990s.

In 1973, a freeway numbering system was introduced to complement existing National Routes and Ring Roads . The signs on the freeways were very similar to the red, white, and blue signs on the US Interstates and were numbered F1 through F8. The F1 was the Warringah Freeway , the F2 was reserved for the Castlereagh Freeway, the route was similar to today's Hills Motorway , the F3 carried the Sydney-Newcastle Freeway , the F4 was the western part of today's Western Motorway (formerly Western Freeway), which The F5 was the freeway part of National Highway 31 , the F6 was assigned to the Southern Freeway , the F7 was reserved for a route along what is now the Cahill Expressway , Eastern Distributor and Bondi Junction Bypass and the F8 was a section of the northern distributor of Wollongong , now part of State Route 60 . Most of these signs have been replaced by other numbers over the decades, and in the 1990s only the F1, F3 and F6 had their original designations. However, the color scheme of the signs has been changed to a simple green on a white background. Today neither the numbering system nor the signs exist, but the F3 and F6 are still known by this name.

The Metroads system still in use today was installed in 1993. It bears the eye-catching hexagonal signs with blue letters on a white background. Originally there were six Metroads: Metroad 1 replaced National Route 1 in the urban area of Sydney, Metroad 2 replaced parts of State Routes 28 and 30 (and gradually became the Hills Motorway ), Metroad 3 emerged from the old Ring Road 3 , Metroad 4 emerged from the F4 Freeway and part of National Route 32, Metroad 5 replaced the urban part of National Highway 31, and Metroad 7 emerged from State Route 77. Later Metroad 6 replaced State Route 45, Metroad 9 replaced the Part of State Route 69 running in Sydney and Metroad 10 finally emerged from State Route 14, south of Mona Vale . A Metroad 8 never existed.

The state of New South Wales is currently preparing to replace the entire system of State Routes, National Routes, National Highway and Metroads with an alphanumeric system. However, until it was not determined when the change should take place. All new signs are already attached to the highways, but covered with a cover.

Road types

Most of the highways in New South Wales are two-lane, with one lane in each direction. There are only a few freeways with several lanes in each direction, separate lanes and intersection-free exits and entrances similar to the German autobahn . With the completion of the Holbrook bypass in August 2013, the Hume Highway was completely expanded to four lanes. In addition, 70% of the Pacific Highway has four lanes (as of July 2016). Complete completion is expected in 2020.