The Rocade de Bordeaux is a

ring road A ring road (also known as circular road, beltline, beltway, circumferential (high)way, loop, bypass or orbital) is a road or a series of connected roads encircling a town, city, or country. The most common purpose of a ring road is to assist i ...

crosses almost all the municipalities of

Bordeaux Métropole Bordeaux Métropole is the ''métropole'', an intercommunal structure, centred on the city of Bordeaux. It is located in the center of the Gironde department, in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, in South West France. It represents about half of t ...

and the

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( , ; Gascon oc, Bordèu ; eu, Bordele; it, Bordò; es, Burdeos) is a port city on the river Garonne in the Gironde department, Southwestern France. It is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the prefectur ...

urban area. It is made up of

A630 autoroute The A630 autoroute is a motorway in south west France. It is the bypass for Bordeaux, also called '' Rocade'', and forms part of the European routes E5 E70. It has 2 lanes each way and currently is being widened to 3 lanes. The construction of th ...

, section of European routes E5 and E70, on the left bank of the Garonne (western ring road), and route nationale 230 on the right bank (east ring road). It is located in the extension of the

A10 autoroute The A10, also called L'Aquitaine, is an Autoroute in France, running for 549 km (341 mi) from the A6 south of Paris to the A630 at Bordeaux. It is the longest motorway in France. It generally parallels the N10 Route Nationale, but dev ...

and at the intersection of the A89 (via route nationale 89), A62 and

A63 autoroute The A63 autoroute is a motorway in southwest France, connecting Bordeaux (from Junction 15 of the A630 autoroute, Rocade) to the border with Spain and Basque Country (autonomous community), Basque Country via the Autopista AP-8. The motorway, rathe ...

s. It is long, making it the longest ring road in France before Nantes (43 km),

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

(35.5 km), Toulouse (35 km) and Rennes (31 km). The term ring road was preferred to that of peripheral boulevard to avoid confusion with the boulevards surrounding the city center of Bordeaux. Rocade de Bordeaux is monitored by the C.R.S. Aquitaine motorway based in

Cenon Cenon (; Gascon: ''Senon'') is a commune in the Gironde department in Nouvelle-Aquitaine in southwestern France. It is a suburb of the city of Bordeaux, and is adjacent to it on the east side. Population See also *Communes of the Gironde dep ...

. This police service can be reached at number 112 or at 05.56.31.79.22 for any emergency on the Bordeaux motorway sector.

History

The construction of Rocade de Bordeaux was decided by Jacques Chaban-Delmas in 1958, to preserve the city center by diverting heavy traffic. It was built in sections over 27 years (from 1967 with the commissioning of the

Pont d'Aquitaine The Pont d'Aquitaine is a large suspension bridge over the Garonne, north-west of the city of Bordeaux, in France. It forms part of the ring-road of Bordeaux and carries the A630 autoroute. It was completed in 1967 and its main span is long. Th ...

, to 1993 with that of the Pont François-Mitterrand). The ring road serves 14 municipalities in the Bordeaux Métropole.

Structure and layout

The eastern ring road, the most recent, was built from the outset in 2x3 lanes, on the other hand the western ring road, the oldest and the longest (31 km), was built in only 2x2 lanes. Also, the western ring road is widened to 2x3 lanes with the southern section (from exit 21 to 12), 15 km built from 1997 to 2015, south-west section (from exit 12 to 10), 3 km built in November 2016, western section (from exit 10 to 9), built in September 2018, and north-west section (from exit 9 to 4), under study over 9.4 km that is planned to be converted to 2x3 lanes in 2022.

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rocade De Bordeaux Ring roads in France Transport in Bordeaux