Bundesautobahn 6

A6
Bundesautobahn 6
Route information
Length: 477 km (296 mi)
Major junctions
West end: French border near Saarbrücken
 
East end: Czech border near Waidhaus
Location
States: Saarland, Rhineland-Palatinate, Hesse, Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria
Highway system
  • Roads in Germany
← A 5A 7 →

Bundesautobahn 6 (translates from German as Federal Motorway 6, short form Autobahn 6, abbreviated as BAB 6 or A 6), also known as Via Carolina (between Nürnberg and the Czech border continuing to Prague) is a 477 km (296.4 mi) long German autobahn. It starts at the French border near Saarbrücken in the west and end at the Czech border near Waidhaus in the east.

The first plans for the A 6 were laid out in 1935, construction on several parts began in 1938. In 1940, construction near Mannheim was stopped when the bridge across the Rhine collapsed, killing many workers. A new bridge, the Theodor Heuss Bridge (Frankenthal), was opened in 1953. Other parts of the A 6 were completed in 1941. A part near Kaiserslautern was used as an airstrip by the Luftwaffe during World War II. After the war, it was taken over by US forces and became the Ramstein Air Base, while the A 6 was re-built south of the air base.

Weinsberg intersection of the A 6 and A 81. The A 6 runs from bottom-left to top-right.

In the 1960s, construction was continued. One new section cut through the Hockenheimring, requiring a major redesign of the race track which resulted in the construction of the Motodrom stadium.

Much like its southern counterpart, the A 8, the A 6 is relatively old and has received little upgrading, making it difficult for it to handle today's traffic. The section around Mannheim is currently being widened and modernised from a four-lane to a six-lane motorway requiring the construction of a new bridge over the River Neckar.

About the Kocher Viaduct (German: Kochertalbrücke) near Schwäbisch Hall, the Autobahn 6 crosses the Kocher valley between Heilbronn and Nuremberg. With its maximum height of 607 ft. (185m) above the valley bottom, it is the highest viaduct in Germany.

Kochertalbrücke

The direct motorway connection between Prague and Paris was completed when the last missing section between junction Amberg-Ost and interchange Oberpfälzer Wald was inaugurated on 10 September 2008.

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Sunday, February 14, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.