The M4 road is a metropolitan route in the

City of Tshwane The City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality (also known as the City of Tshwane) () is the metropolitan municipality that forms the local government of northern Gauteng Province, South Africa. The Metropolitan area is centred on the city of Pr ...

Gauteng Gauteng ( ) is one of the nine provinces of South Africa. The name in Sotho-Tswana languages means 'place of gold'. Situated on the Highveld, Gauteng is the smallest province by land area in South Africa. Although Gauteng accounts for only ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

. It connects

Pretoria Pretoria () is South Africa's administrative capital, serving as the seat of the Executive (government), executive branch of government, and as the host to all foreign embassies to South Africa. Pretoria straddles the Apies River and extends ...

with

Hartbeespoort Hartbeespoort, informally also known as "Harties", is a small resort town in the North West Province of South Africa, situated on slopes of the Magaliesberg mountain and the banks of the Hartbeespoort Dam. The name of the town means "gateway of th ...

. The route is a

toll road A toll road, also known as a turnpike or tollway, is a public or private road (almost always a controlled-access highway in the present day) for which a fee (or ''toll'') is assessed for passage. It is a form of road pricing typically implemented ...

, with two tollgates on the Freeway section between

Pretoria West Pretoria West is a suburb of Pretoria, South Africa, situated from the city centre. According to the 2011 census, it has a population of 11,535 (1,869.99 per km²). Notable companies Notable companies based in Pretoria West include: * Pre ...

and Hartbeespoort (one at either end). For its entire length, it is parallel to the R104 Road, which also connects Pretoria with Hartbeespoort.

Route

The M4 begins in

Arcadia Arcadia may refer to: Places Australia * Arcadia, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney * Arcadia, Queensland * Arcadia, Victoria Greece * Arcadia (region), a region in the central Peloponnese * Arcadia (regional unit), a modern administrative un ...

(just west of the

Union Buildings The Union Buildings ( af, Uniegebou) form the official seat of the South African Government and also house the offices of the President of South Africa. The imposing buildings are located in Pretoria, atop Meintjieskop at the northern end of ...

), at a junction with the two one-way-streets that form the M5 route (Hamilton Street; Steve Biko Street). It starts as two one-way streets (Johannes Ramokhoase Street, formerly Proes Street, westwards from the M5 and Struben Street eastwards to the M5), heading westwards. It enters the Pretoria CBD and meets the two one-way streets of the M18 route (Thabo Sehume Street; Bosman Street) before meeting the two one-way streets of the R101 Route (Sophie de Bruyn Street; Kgosi Mampuru Street). At the junction with the M1 route (E'skia Mphahlele Drive) in

Marabastad Marabastad (also called Asiatic Bazaar or Location) is a business area near the city centre of Pretoria, South Africa. The original ''Maraba Village'', situated just to the south of the present Marabastad, was founded and ruled by the Ndebele C ...

, the M4 stops being two one-way streets and becomes one street westwards named Vom Hagen Street, passing through

. At the junction with the

R55 Route The R55 is a north-south provincial route in Gauteng, South Africa that connects Sandton with Pretoria. It passes Woodmead, Kyalami, Olievenhoutbosch, Heuweloord, Sunderland Ridge, Erasmia, Laudium/Claudius, West Park, the Daspoort Tunnel ...

(Transoranje Road) south of Danville, the M4 becomes the Magalies Toll Route and has the Quagga Toll Gate just after. The M4 heads west as a freeway for , with one off-ramp north of

Atteridgeville Atteridgeville is a township located to the west of Pretoria, South Africa. It is located to the east of Saulsville, to the west of West Park; to the north of Laudium and to the south of Lotus Gardens. The settlement was established in 1939, and ...

, to reach the Pelindaba Toll Gate just before the

North West Province North West is a province of South Africa. Its capital is Mahikeng. The province is located to the west of the major population centre of Gauteng and south of Botswana. History North West was incorporated after the end of Apartheid in 1994, an ...

boundary. Immediately after the tollgate, the M4 ends at an off-ramp t-junction, with the road southwards providing access to

Pelindaba Pelindaba ("Pelile Ndaba", Zulu for "end of story" or "the conclusion") is South Africa's main nuclear research centre, run by the South African Nuclear Energy Corporation. It is situated near the Hartbeespoort Dam, approximately 33 km (22&n ...

and

Broederstroom Broederstroom is a small town situated on the Daspoortrand in the foothills of the Magaliesberg mountains in the North West Province (South Africa), North West Province of South Africa. History Settlement in the Witwatersrand, Witwatersberg, sou ...

( away) and the road northwards providing access to the R511 Road to

( away).

History

The current M4 was part of the original main route from

to the west towards

Rustenburg Rustenburg (; , Afrikaans and Dutch: ''City of Rest'') is a city at the foot of the Magaliesberg mountain range. Rustenburg is the most populous city in North West province, South Africa (549,575 in 2011 and 626,522 in the 2016 census). In 2017 ...

. The entire stretch of road from Pretoria to Hartbeespoort was previously part of the N4 National Route, which connects the

Mozambique Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...

Border in the east with the

Botswana Botswana (, ), officially the Republic of Botswana ( tn, Lefatshe la Botswana, label=Setswana, ), is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory being the Kalahar ...

Border in the west. Then, the N4 was realigned on a new highway known as the

Pretoria Bypass The Pretoria Ring Road, also known as the Pretoria Bypass, is a collection of two bypasses that together form a partial ring road around the city of Pretoria, South Africa. It consists of a section of the N1 Highway (known as the Eastern Bypass) ...

, which forms part of the

Platinum Highway The Platinum Highway is part of the N4, and a major South African highway built under concessions with a private contractor. In 2001, the project was voted Infrastructure Deal of the Year by Project Finance International Magazine. It took eight ye ...

maintained by Bakwena, in order for the city centre to be bypassed to the north and east. So, both Hartbeespoort and Pretoria Central are bypassed to the north. The old route through Pretoria Central, specifically from the M5 junction to the west, was then re-designated as the M4 Metropolitan Route of Tshwane, although some Global Positioning Systems still label this old route as the N4 together with the newer route north of Pretoria. Even the road signage on the Magalies Toll Freeway section may still have ''N4'' indicated rather than ''M4,'' with ''M4'' showing on signs off the highway.

References

{{Reflist Toll roads in South Africa Highways in South Africa Metropolitan Routes in Pretoria