Via Balbia
As Via Balbo (or Via Balbo ), the 1,822 km long coastal road was Libya indicated that runs along the southern Mediterranean coast to colonial times in Italian Libya was built.
On the occasion of a visit to Libya by the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini in March 1937, the trunk road built for civil and military purposes was ceremoniously opened. Governor Italo Balbo was responsible for the work . After his death in 1940, the Italian administration named the street after him.
The Via Balbia was a paved and paved road. During the Africa campaign of World War II, it served both sides as a strategically important traffic axis and was therefore the scene of fierce fighting between the Axis powers and the Allies, in which it was damaged in parts.
About halfway down the street near El Agheila was a triumphal arch , the Arco dei Fileni , which was designed by the architect Florestano di Fausto to mark the border between Tripolitania and Cyrenaica (see also the border between Western and Eastern Rome ). The inscription on the arch read: Alme Sol, possis nihil urbe Roma visere maius (Latin: "O mild sun, may you see nothing greater than the city of Rome"). The arch was torn down in 1970 by the revolutionary troops of Muammar al-Gaddafi .
In 1967 the road was paved again. Since Hussein Maziq (Prime Minister 1965-1967) there were plans to expand into a four-lane expressway, of which only the sections Sabrata - Tripoli - Misrata and Ajdabiya - Benghazi - Tocra were implemented before the coup in 1969 . In recent years, the Libyan People's Committee has commissioned the four-lane expansion of the westernmost section between Ras Ejder and Sabrata.
Places (selection)
from west to east. Big cities are in bold
- Ras Ejder (border with Tunisia)
- Zuwara
- Sabrata
- az-Zawiya
- Tripoli
- al-Chums
- Misrata
- Abu Qurayn (junction of Fezzan Road)
- Sirte
- Ben Javad
- as-Sidr
- Ras Lanuf
- El Agheila
- Qaryat Bishop
- Brega
- Ajdabiya
- Benghazi
- al-Baida
- The NA
- Tobruk
- Bardia
- Musaid (border with Egypt)
See also
Individual evidence
- Al Hadi Mustafa Bulegma & Sayad Chaleil Kezeiri (ed.), "Al Jamahiriya: Dirasa fil Jughrafia", ad-Dar al-Jamahirijaa lil nashr wa tawzee wa e'lan, Sirte , 1995.
- Decision of the People's Committee on the four-lane expansion of the Ras Ejder-Sabratha road for public use (Arabic) ( Memento from February 19, 2009 in the Internet Archive ).
- G. Pini, La rete stradale dell'Impero , in “Africa Italiana”, December 1939, n.12
