![CZ traffic sign IS16a - D1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/05/CZ_traffic_sign_IS16a_-_D1.svg)
Highways in the
Czech Republic
The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...
are managed by the state-owned Road and Motorway Directorate of the Czech Republic
ŘSD ČR established in 1997. The ŘSD currently (september 2022) manages and maintains 1,355 km of motorways (''dálnice''), whose speed limit is of 130 km/h or 80 mph (or 80 km/h or 50 mph within a town). The present-day national motorway network is due to be of about 2,000 km before 2030.
Network map
Toll requirements
Motorcars up to 3.5 tonnes
In 2018, for motorcars with a maximum authorized mass of up to 3.5 tonnes, motorways in the Czech Republic (with some exceptions, see below) are subject to a ''time-based fee'' (''časový poplatek'') paid with the purchase of a windscreen toll
vignette
Vignette may refer to:
* Vignette (entertainment), a sketch in a sketch comedy
* Vignette (graphic design), decorative designs in books (originally in the form of leaves and vines) to separate sections or chapters
* Vignette (literature), short, i ...
(''dálniční známka'' or ''dálniční kupón'') with a validity of either 10 days (310
CZK
The koruna, or crown, ( sign: Kč; code: CZK, cs, koruna česká) has been the currency of the Czech Republic since 1993. The koruna is one of the European Union's 9 currencies, and the Czech Republic is legally bound to adopt the euro curre ...
), 1 month (440 CZK) or 1 year (valid from 1 December 2017 to 31 January 2019) (1500 CZK).
Generally said, a motorway road sign
![CZ traffic sign IZ1a](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c7/CZ_traffic_sign_IZ1a.svg)
means that a toll vignette (windscreen label) is obligatory (usually not immediately from the border on). Only sections not subject to vignette are designated with an additional road sign (see below).
File:CZ-E11 Bez časového poplatku - 2007.jpg, A road sign indicating that a motorway sections is not subject to vignette. ≤ 3.5t (usually placed under the road sign for motorway
)
File:CZ-E11b S časovým poplatkem (2016).jpg, A road sign indicating the beginning of the motorway vignette (toll label) duty for cars ≤ 3.5t (usually placed under the road sign for the motorway after the end of toll-free section
)
For 2018, the following motorway sections are subject to the time-based fee for motor cars up to 3.5 t:
Vehicles over 3.5 tonnes
As of 1 January 2007 a new system of
electronic toll aka a distance toll for vehicles with a weight exceeding 12 tons has been introduced for motorways and some roads of the first class (''silnice první třídy''), totally cca 200 km. As of 1 January 2010, this applies also to vehicles over 3.5 tons. There is an ongoing public discussion on imposition of electronic toll for all cars and vehicles.
File:CZ-IP15c Mýtné - 2007.jpg, A road sign informing of the beginning of the electronic toll duty for vehicles > 3.5t
File:CZ-E11f S časovým poplatkem a mýtným (2016).jpg, A road sign informing of the beginning of both motorway vignette (toll label) and electronic toll duty
File:CZ-E11b Bez časového poplatku a mýtného - 2007.jpg, A road sign informing of the motorway section subject to neither motorway vignette (toll label) nor electronic toll duty
History of Czech motorways
Before the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...
![RAB v roku 1939](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a3/RAB_v_roku_1939.svg)
The first informal plan for a motorway (first called in Czech ''autostráda'' or ''dálková silnice'') in
Czechoslovakia
, rue, Чеськословеньско, , yi, טשעכאסלאוואקיי,
, common_name = Czechoslovakia
, life_span = 1918–19391945–1992
, p1 = Austria-Hungary
, image_p1 ...
date back to 1935. This was to link Prague through
Slovakia
Slovakia (; sk, Slovensko ), officially the Slovak Republic ( sk, Slovenská republika, links=no ), is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the s ...
with the easternmost Czechoslovak territory,
Carpathian Ruthenia
Carpathian Ruthenia ( rue, Карпатьска Русь, Karpat'ska Rus'; uk, Закарпаття, Zakarpattia; sk, Podkarpatská Rus; hu, Kárpátalja; ro, Transcarpatia; pl, Zakarpacie); cz, Podkarpatská Rus; german: Karpatenukrai ...
(now
Zakarpattia Oblast
The Zakarpattia Oblast ( uk, Закарпатська область, Zakarpatska oblast) is an administrative oblast located in western Ukraine, mostly coterminous with the historical region of Carpathian Ruthenia. Its administrative centre is ...
in Ukraine). The terminus was to be at
Velykyy Bychkiv
Velykyi Bychkiv ( uk, Вели́кий Бичкі́в; rue, Великый Бичкôв; hu, Nagybocskó, Nagybocska; ro, Bocicoiu Mare; cs, Velký Bočkov; sk, Veľký Bočkov, Bočková) is an urban-type settlement in Rakhiv Raion (distric ...
(''Velký Bočkov'' in Czech) on the
Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, and ...
n border. The definitive route, including a Prague ring motorway, was approved shortly after the
Munich Agreement
The Munich Agreement ( cs, Mnichovská dohoda; sk, Mníchovská dohoda; german: Münchner Abkommen) was an agreement concluded at Munich on 30 September 1938, by Germany, the United Kingdom, France, and Italy. It provided "cession to Germany ...
on 4 November 1938, with a planned speed limit of 120 km/h.
The Nazi authorities also made the
second Czecho-Slovak Republic, already a German
satellite state
A satellite state or dependent state is a country that is formally independent in the world, but under heavy political, economic, and military influence or control from another country. The term was coined by analogy to planetary objects orbitin ...
, build a part of the
Reichsautobahn
The ''Reichsautobahn'' system was the beginning of the German autobahns under Nazi Germany. There had been previous plans for controlled-access highways in Germany under the Weimar Republic, and two had been constructed, but work had yet to st ...
Breslau -
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
as an
extraterritorial
In international law, extraterritoriality is the state of being exempted from the jurisdiction of local law, usually as the result of diplomatic negotiations.
Historically, this primarily applied to individuals, as jurisdiction was usually cl ...
German motorway with border checkpoints at each motorway exit. However, only a construction of the route within
Bohemia and Moravia
The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia; cs, Protektorát Čechy a Morava; its territory was called by the Nazis ("the rest of Czechia"). was a partially annexed territory of Nazi Germany established on 16 March 1939 following the German occ ...
was initiated, but never finished. It still sporadically appears in some current Czech motorway plans.
On 1 December 1938 Nazi Germany had already initiated a construction of the so-called Sudetenautobahn (in
Sudetenland, before the Munich agreement part of Czechoslovakia, then of Germany) in the route Streitau (Bavaria) –
Eger
Eger ( , ; ; also known by other alternative names) is the county seat of Heves County, and the second largest city in Northern Hungary (after Miskolc). A city with county rights. Eger is best known for its castle, thermal baths, baroque bui ...
–
Carlsbad –
Lobositz
Lovosice (; german: Lobositz) is a town in Litoměřice District in the Ústí nad Labem Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 8,600 inhabitants. It is an industrial town.
Geography
Lovosice is located about southwest of Litoměřice and ...
–
Böhmisch Leipa –
Reichenberg (capital of Sudetenland) –
Görlitz (in
Prussia
Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an ...
, now in
Saxony
Saxony (german: Sachsen ; Upper Saxon: ''Saggsn''; hsb, Sakska), officially the Free State of Saxony (german: Freistaat Sachsen, links=no ; Upper Saxon: ''Freischdaad Saggsn''; hsb, Swobodny stat Sakska, links=no), is a landlocked state of ...
). The autobahn has never been finished, but some remnants in the landscape close to
Pomezí nad Ohří,
Cheb
Cheb (; german: Eger) is a town in the Karlovy Vary Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 30,000 inhabitants. It lies on the river Ohře.
Before the 1945 expulsion of the German-speaking population, the town was the centre of the German-s ...
/Eger and
Liberec/Reichenberg are still prominent and an unfinished part from Svárov via Machnín to
Chrastava was used in the construction of the I/35 road.
Nazi occupation
Czechoslovakia was broken up with a declaration of independence by the
Slovak Republic and by the short-lived
Carpatho-Ukraine
Carpatho-Ukraine or Carpathian Ukraine ( uk, Карпа́тська Украї́на, Karpats’ka Ukrayina, ) was an autonomous region within the Second Czechoslovak Republic, created in December 1938 by renaming Subcarpathian Rus' whose full ...
which was a prelude to the German occupation of Bohemia and Moravia on 15 March 1939. It was decided to build the motorway only as far as the Slovak border. The technical parameters of motorways (speed limit of 140 – 160 km/h) were adjusted to those of the German
Reichsautobahn
The ''Reichsautobahn'' system was the beginning of the German autobahns under Nazi Germany. There had been previous plans for controlled-access highways in Germany under the Weimar Republic, and two had been constructed, but work had yet to st ...
, as Czech (Bohemian-Moravian) motorways were to be integrated within the German Reichsautobahn network.
The project for the first segment Prague -
Lužná was ready in January 1939, and construction in
Moravia
Moravia ( , also , ; cs, Morava ; german: link=yes, Mähren ; pl, Morawy ; szl, Morawa; la, Moravia) is a historical region in the east of the Czech Republic and one of three historical Czech lands, with Bohemia and Czech Silesia.
The m ...
began on 24 January in
Chřiby on the
Zástřizly - Lužná segment. The construction in
Bohemia from Prague began on 2 May 1939, with a
switch to right-hand traffic in Bohemia and Moravia having already gone without a hitch. The motorway should have reached Brno in 1940, but building materials and labour shortages due to an absolute priority given to the Nazi armament industry delayed the work considerably. The construction in the route of approx. 77 km from Prague towards
Brno advanced notably, but a prohibition of all civil constructions by the German authorities came into force in 1942.
After the Second World War
After the Second World War, the completion of only the first and unfinished 77 km of the motorway Prague – Brno as far as
Humpolec
Humpolec (; german: Humpoletz) is a town in Pelhřimov District in the Vysočina Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 11,000 inhabitants.
Administrative parts
Villages of Brunka, Hněvkovice, Kletečná, Krasoňov, Lhotka, Petrovice, Pla ...
was approved by the Government in November 1945 and was reinaugurated in 1946. The part-built construction sites of the Sudetenautobahn (28 km) were completely abandoned, as well as that of the Breslau – Vienna motorway (84 km). The latter was, however, incorporated in some plans as a future connection motorway between Brno and the D35 motorway. The 77 km of the Prague – Humpolec motorway had been completed except for some large bridges and a concrete surface when the new communist government decided to discontinue the work completely in early 1950.
Only on 8 August 1967 the Government of the Socialist Republic of Czechoslovakia resolved to continue the construction of motorways by adopting a new motorway plan for the whole country and resolved to continue the already twice interrupted construction of the motorway Prague - Brno (number
D1) and further Brno -
Bratislava (
D2). The construction was solemnly inaugurated on 8 September 1967. Due to a change of technical parameters, some bridges finished before 1950 were replaced. The Prague - Brno motorway (D1), initiated on 2 May 1939, reached Brno in 1980, a full 40 years after the originally scheduled opening.
The pace of construction of highways has always been rather slow up to the present day. The first 100 km of highways on the territory of today's Czech Republic were completed in 1975, 500 km in 1985 and 1,000 km in 2007. Funding for the construction of highways was radically reduced after the financial crisis in 2008 due to draconian budget cuts, and is currently gaining momentum rather slowly for various reasons.
Motorways
![CZ-IP28b Nejvyšší dovolené rychlosti (2016 - verze 2015-07-31)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2e/CZ-IP28b_Nejvy%C5%A1%C5%A1%C3%AD_dovolen%C3%A9_rychlosti_%282016_-_verze_2015-07-31%29.jpg)
The motorways in the Czech Republic, cs, dálnice (abbr. ''D''), are defined as two-lane motorways in each direction, with an emergency lane. The speed limit is 130 km/h or 80 mph. Their
highway shields are white on red and
road sign
Traffic signs or road signs are signs erected at the side of or above roads to give instructions or provide information to road users. The earliest signs were simple wooden or stone milestones. Later, signs with directional arms were introduce ...
s are white on green. As of 1 January 2016, the Czech motorway network comprises 18 motorways. Nowadays, 17 of them are at least partially operational, but only 5 (D2, D5, D8, D10, D46 and D56) have been completed, another one (D1) are near completion,D1 by the end of 2024, by outer source in October 2022.
The number of a motorway reflects a number of the previous national road alongside which it was built up or which it shall replace. After the construction of the motorway, the affected national road is degraded to a regional road with a number beginning on 6 and having 3 digits. For instance, after the completion of the D8 motorway (Prague -
Lovosice
Lovosice (; german: Lobositz) is a town in Litoměřice District in the Ústí nad Labem Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 8,600 inhabitants. It is an industrial town.
Geography
Lovosice is located about southwest of Litoměřice and ...
), the previous national road no. I/8 between Prague and Lovosice became a regional road no. 608. Regional roads are maintained by the self-governing regions (
kraj
A kraj ( ''kraje'') is the highest-level administrative unit in the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. For lack of other English expressions, the Slavic term is often translated as "province", "region", or "territory", although it approxim ...
) and not by the state directly.
Originally, a motorway D47 was planned from Brno to Ostrava and construction in the section Lipník nad Bečvou - Ostrava under this number even started, but in the end the ŘSD in 2006 decided that the D47 should be classified as an extension of the D1 motorway.
Roads for motorcars
The category of roads for motorcars (''Silnice pro motorová vozidla'') was changed on 31 December 2015. Most roads for motorcars were classified as fully fledged motorways, while some sections remained in the same category. The
speed limit
Speed limits on road traffic, as used in most countries, set the legal maximum speed at which vehicles may travel on a given stretch of road. Speed limits are generally indicated on a traffic sign reflecting the maximum permitted speed - expre ...
for most existing roads for motorcars was reduced to 110 km/h.
As of 2016, roads for motorcars are not subject to highway tolls for vehicles with total weight up to 3.5 t. The
signs on roads for motorcars consist of white text on a blue background, like on other common roads and unlike on motorways, where the background is green. Exits, like on motorways, are usually numbered.
It is in the jurisdiction of individual regions (
''kraje'') to decide whether roads for motorcars should have higher speed limits than regular roads. An example of this is the expressway R35 between Liberec and Turnov which has not been classified as of 1 January 2016 as a motorway but an exceptional speed limit of up to 130 km/h was kept using road signs.
List of completed roads for motorcars
Planned upgrade to road for motorcars:
*
I/7 Spořice - Křimov
*
I/13 Chomutov - Teplice (some parts)
*
I/13 Ostrov - Karlovy Vary
*
I/11 Ostrava-Vítkovice - Šenov
*
I/14 Liberec: interchange I/35 - roundabout Kunratice (direction Jablonec n. N.)
*
I/34 České Budějovice - Lišov, interchange Na Klaudě St. (after completion of the interchange Úsilné between motorway D3 and I/34)
*
I/35 roundabout Hrádek nad Nisou - Liberec, interchange Hodkovická St.(inc. border road, only a single carriageway road)
Opening of new motorways
Construction of new motorways in recent years has been hampered due to
corruption scandals and
austerity measures as well as owing to new European rules under which old
EIA assessments lapsed. See the table below. However, this should improve slightly in next years. By the end of 2017, there were 58.2 km of new motorways under construction, in 2018 a construction of further 130.3 km should be initiated (apart from the ongoing reconstruction of the motorway D1). Nonetheless, only 18.1 km of new motorways may open to public in 2018, 18.8 km in 2019 and 29.7 in 2020.
Between 1971 and 2014 the average year pace of completion of new highways was 28.2 km a year.
See also
*
Transport in the Czech Republic
Transport in the Czech Republic relies on several main modes, including transport by road, rail, water and air.
Railways
The Czech Republic has a total railway length of . The vast majority () is standard gauge. Electrified railways generally ha ...
*
List of controlled-access highway systems
Many countries have national networks of controlled-access highways, the names of which vary from one country to another e.g. freeway or motorway. The networks do not always include all such highways, or even all the major ones in the country.
Asi ...
*
Evolution of motorway construction in European countries
References
External links
ŘSD official web site
{{Motorways in Europe
Highways
A highway is any public or private road or other public way on land. It is used for major roads, but also includes other public roads and public tracks. In some areas of the United States, it is used as an equivalent term to controlled-access ...