route de l'Espoir

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Course of the road
A herd of cattle crosses the road

The route de l'Espoir ( French ) or the Tariq al-Amal ( Arabic طريق الأمل, DMG Tarīq al-ʾĀmal ), "Road of Hope", also called Transmauritanienne , is the only Mauritanian trunk road in a west-east direction. Construction began in the 1970s; The completion took place in 1985.

It connects almost the entire south of the country over a length of 1,100 kilometers and runs from the capital Nouakchott in the west to the city of Néma in the east. The road is paved throughout . It runs at the transition between the Sahara in the north and the dry savannah in the south. The first section from the state capital to around Boutilimit leads through some areas with sand dunes ( Erg ) , where sand drifts can lead to accidents or make it impossible to continue your journey.

Larger towns along the road are Boutilimit , Aleg , Kiffa , Ayoun el-Atrouss and Timbédra . From the 1970s onwards, economic and ecological reasons forced the population, who until then had mostly been nomads , to settle down. This created problems for many ranchers as it was difficult for them to find a suitable place to live. While most of the land is state owned, some tribes feel they are landowners and do not allow strangers to settle in their area. As an alternative, there was often only an escape to the state capital or the option of settling along the Route de l'Espoir, since the area of ​​the road is generally accepted as free land. The resulting new settlements along the road often do not have enough water or usable arable or pasture land.

The road that crosses the country in a north-south direction along the coast is called Piste Impériale and is part of the Cairo-Dakar Highway .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Valerie Diallo: Man and nature in Mauritania. On the relationship of former nomads to nature and its protection. (Social science writings on land use and rural development) Margraf Publishers, Weikersheim 2005, p. 23