BBC

Some hairy design standards through Western eyes, but good news nonetheles. It's not showing properly on GoogleMaps, but there are some interesting satellite views of construction.

Very interesting, had a look at some Panoramio photos of it. The central crash barrier looks rather lethal: http://v7.cache2.c.bigcache.googleapis.com/static.panoramio.com/photos/original/51317807.jpg?redirect_counter=1

Otherwise it seems pretty good - a little substandard by usual national motorway/freeway standards because of the narrow hard shoulders, but then many grade-separated (non motorway/freeway) dual carriageways don't have any at all. I'm not sure how Sri Lanka is classifying this.

I know Sri Lanka is not exactly the US, UK or Australia but how can they put a wire rope barrier in the centre like that? It won't do anything for preventing head on crashes given that when a vehicle hits the barrier, the barrier will slacken about 1-2 metres while it absorbs the impact...right into an oncoming truck. You'd be just as safe having nothing there at all.

The lack of any shoulders and the inadequate merge lanes are probably less of an issue but still below most 1st world design standards.

Yes, terrible.

I was in Sri Lanka about 4 years ago when this project was beginning and the term expressway was used for it

edit Southern Expressway



The standard of driving in Sri Lanka is alarming. It is even more alarming that there are places with higher accident rates!

The new road will be safer, but not accident free

Eeek!

Those are there more for decoration than actual safety, you'd have to think. Although I suppose it would prevent someone going all the way across the other carriageway, just hope nobody is in the right lane when you crash into the barrier.

I don't know what you mean. From what I can see this is a perfectly fine road built by high standards. Certainly nothing short of the standards here in Europe. The lit junction even seemed to me a bit over-engineering.

It looks rather like any A-road D2 built here in the last 10 years to be honest.

Apart from the narrow lanes - it puts me in mind of a 30s bypass, reasonable grade separation notwithstanding.

So when the M6 Preston bypass was opened did it have shoulders ?

How long was that road ?

I think Sri Lanka has done a fine job of constructing a new freeway for a first attempt it is pretty decent piece of road.

You didnt expect a superslab for a first dauble ? Have a look at some of the roads in europe there are some motorways that are quite scary compared to this new road that has just opened.

Yes - just not hard-shoulders .

Looks to be more engineered than the A46 which doesn't have edge of carriageway crash barriers - even on embankments (at the Bingham junction anyway!) - although at least the grass isn't growing over the road yet!

This is a major achievement for Sri Lanka that it should be very proud of. And it is a decent length - about 100 kilometres (62 miles).

Ireland's first motorway - the M7 Naas Bypass - was a pathetic 8 kilometres when it opened in 1983.

E01 : Anyone know if the 'E' translates to anything familiar ?

Junction for a 'B' road. Can we speculate that they have 'A' and 'B' ?

Expressway, at a guess. The news story at the top of the thread refers to it as such.


Yes, they do. We can do better than speculate. We can see them on a map

Thanks. Should have tried that one for myself.

Expressway, at a guess. The news story at the top of the thread refers to it as such.

Many Asian countries use the term 'expressway' for a limited-access highway, so it would make sense. It just confuses the people from North America who use the term for a lesser standard of road

From the initial posts I was expecting something of poor quality - like the A66! . But no, it looks like a very good quality D2 road - certainly not UK full motorway standard, but above the standard of dual carriageways here.

Some advice on driving on same
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umuhH2IHoXU

I was in Sri Lanka and they are building a (much needed) expressway towards Colombo airport. I didn't get any pics, but I noticed (from the train) that there was a significant elevated section being built. Not quite sure why this was felt necessary rather than a traditional embankment.

They are proposing a new rail link to the airport also, partly parallel to the expressway. This would put them ahead of any airport in Ireland. Ireland may be expensive for tourists, but I don't think we could propose charging tourists 12 times as much as locals for such a train! Hard to see how this would work given than it would be more than a taxi!

I hope you enjoyed your stay in Sri Lanka. I'd like to visit there at some stage. It's also interesting that the motorway from the airport to the capital city was not their first big roads project - as is often the case in developing countries. Ireland's first section of M1 in 1985 (only the second section of motorway to open in the country) was from Dublin city to Dublin airport.

Whatever the merits of a rail connection from Colombo to its airport may be, I find it frankly embarrassing that Dublin Airport still does not have a rail link to the city.