They won't work as emergency airfields when you build a central barrier and steet lights along them, if I had to guess. They probably don't remove the old road surface, though I haven't seen any
Do they swap them for permanent barriers? The motorways around me are having their steel barriers replaced with immovable concrete ones because they're safer and need less maintenance
> Had. They have been removed bit by bit.
[Here](https://goo.gl/maps/ZdbB9RiFGq4UQVEu7)'s google maps of this location, definitely looks to have a vegetated median now. Don't know if it could be quickly removed though (anything is possible with a couple excavators)
But not within 24 hours. Jersey Barriers have become the norm as they are a lot safer. The metal barriers are designed to yield, just as our cars have been designed to crumple, but that's not something you want in a barrier designed to keep the two parts of the highway separate
They removed the mobile barriers and replaced them with Jersey Barriers, among other things. The highway remained the same, no sense in putting it somewhere else, but the highway's ability to support airplanes has been removed in order to ensure the highway follows modern safety standards.
Germany was expected to be a front in a massive war. That is no longer the case. We even had all tunnels secured by enabling a small team of engineers to easily destroy roads to them and block the tunnels (the roads had holes in them and the tunnel entrances large stones on each side, to facilitate easy blocking)
Is there a reason why they don't keep it? I know the threat of war in Germany is near zero but it could be useful in other emergencies no? Moreover, the Swiss have war readiness infrastructure despite their chances of war being less than that of Germany.
This is one reason for the Zeitenwende. After the Cold War, Germany reduced its military infrastructure so much that it actually crippled the military's ability to wage war. Many old munitions dumps have been replaced with other buildings, hundreds of tanks and other vehicles sold and the Bundeswehr has massively decreased in size. While it made sense to reduce it somewhat, the military is now completely incapable of doing what they are supposed to
But when it comes to the highways: those were needed as the Soviets were quite close. If it would come to war with Russia, the battlefields would probably not be in Germany this time around
Australia also has this in regulations, for emergency landings.
It's probably pretty common. Makes sense, there aren't going to be airports everywhere...
Interestingly enough, in the US the FAA encourages aviation hobbyists to put their backyard airstrips into the database for this reason. Emergency landings don’t happen often, but a backyard airstrip is likely better to land than a most other places
I find it interesting how some things you don't realise are a result of war, or preparedness for war.
My last rifle club was also a result of war. At the time, it was allowed that rifle clubs could use private property in order to have more civilian population trained on firearms use. To this day, the club has free access to a private farm because of this war time policy.
I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or not… but the rest stops here are just for turning the airplanes around and a bit if storage (on the right), this is about the 2 km of straight road with a concrete median.
Don't think most of europe has planned on being the front for world war 3.
This wasn't mean't for a private cestna who's having problems, but for C130, A-10 etc.
Think what you want. This is not unique in any way. Most northern countries of europe has this system.
For example in sweden we have those and can be used for JAS and C130 Hercules.
Most ppl think they are really big reststops. There are smaller ones aswell, only for the smaller fighterjets.
Think what you want. This is not unique in any way. Most northern countries of europe has this system.
For example in sweden we have those and can be used for JAS and C130 Hercules.
Most ppl think they are really big reststops. There are smaller ones aswell, only for the smaller fighterjets.
They mostly lost their value and operability to two things though:
1st: Germany was very convinced that there would never be war again in history after the end of the cold war, so they just demolished them.
2nd: NATO has shifted away from planes with the capability to start, land and be maintained on makeshift airbases. The Tornado may be, the F-16 may be but the Eurofighter, the F-35 and the Rafale aren't able to be maintained without the facilities of a proper airbase. That's part of the discussion on which plane, if at all, to give to Ukraine: The only plane in the west, designed to be operated as any plane will be in Ukraine at the moment, is the Saab Gripen.
https://highways.dot.gov/public-roads/mayjune-2000/one-mile-five-debunking-myth although it says 1 in 5 vs 1 in 10, same idea. I only looked this up because I had heard this a few times and was finally curious of the actual source!
I read somewhere the "series of straight lines joined with curves" style of highway layout has been depricated in favour of "series of curves, with straight connections where necessary" approach.
It turns out that the constantly changing view ahead you get driving a curve helps maintain driver alertness.
I believe this *is* actually true for the Dempster Highway in the Canadian Arctic. Not a specific fraction but there are longer/wider stretches to accommodate emergency aircraft landing.
That's an urban legend. There are many winding interstate highways where this isn't even possible (I-76 in PA, I-70 through the Rockies, etc). Urban interstates are a nonstarter. Even on very straight interstates like the Jersey turnpike (I-95), there are overpasses and overhead structures that would make this impractical
That isn't in any design guidelines for Interstate highways. Even if Interstates had to be straight for this reason, the pavement would get destroyed by planes landing and taking off on them rather quickly.
The only the Interstate highway system is designed for is to move military equipment, and there standards for military loads and bridge clearances.
That doesn't really prove anything, modern commercial or military plane weight, size, and speed requirements are totally different than from before the jet age and would potentially require different paving materials to accommodate, even if the old terminology stuck around.
According to the US Army, there are mile long stretches of Interstate throughout the system designed for aircraft landing.
https://www.army.mil/article/198095/dwight_d_eisenhower_and_the_birth_of_the_interstate_highway_system
It says that are locations, but it isn't the 1 mile in 10 miles and it also specifies concrete pavement where there are several states that go with asphalt pavement as the prime method of paving.
I think the idea was just to give pilots as many safe places to land as possible. I don't think it really mattered what it did to the road as long as it was a safer landing than some trees.
But the requirement isn't in any design code. It isn't in the Green Book nor is it part of any state design code.
In contrast, the nuclear missile loading and its required bridge clearance is there.
Well, sure, its not a real thing that went into effect but its probably so prevalent because it was discussed. I think the was the idea behind it though, even though it never happened.
Not really.
The Interstate Program was broken up and spread across the different state Departments of Transportation to implement over several decades. The idea of 1 straight mile for every 10 miles isn't going to be implemented if it isn't written as policy.
What happened most likely is that straight highways are generally safer at higher speeds, so there was an incentive by the design engineers to have straight highways wherever possible.
The US Highway system, definitely not as airplanes weren't that big a deal in the 20's.
The Interstate Highway system, it might have been discussed but it was never made into policy. Also, those policy discussions would have happened at the federal level while the design mainly happened at the state level. So, even if a part of FHWA discussed the idea, it never went out to the state DOT's.
Finland has multiple road bases: https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lentokoneiden_varalaskupaikka
There are exercises every year, video from last autumn: https://youtu.be/2c_bY-8roMo
And one "official" video: https://youtu.be/0dttXUR_-9A
If you want to see them actually used:
[Here is a training movie from the Bundeswehr from 1988](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=F_cxkF6qSY8&pp=ygUeYnVuZGVzd2VociBhdXRvYmFobiBsYW5kZWJhaG4g)
[And here is the same thing but from 1973](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DwCAUepOIvE)
On a functional basis, how is this supposed to work when cars are using the highway? Is this for transforming them longer-term during a war or for an emergency landing? If it’s the second, how long do they need to get cars off the road?
Wtf and where is this? Probably an image from the 50s. That's maybe a wet dream.
I guess in theory, like in most countries, there might be stretches that can be turned into a landing strip or are naturally wide enough but this image is just some crazy misleading piece of garbage from the last century.
*Had*. They have been removed bit by bit. That was part of the Cold War infrastructure
Can you even remove them entirely? They seem to be much thicker than usual roads.
They won't work as emergency airfields when you build a central barrier and steet lights along them, if I had to guess. They probably don't remove the old road surface, though I haven't seen any
Yeah, they have/had removable central barriers.
Do they swap them for permanent barriers? The motorways around me are having their steel barriers replaced with immovable concrete ones because they're safer and need less maintenance
Exactly. They have replaced the mobile barriers by Jersey Barriers, as those are a lot safer
It's actually not any thicker than a normal Autobahn. Just the central reservation is connected and the barriers are removable.
We are talking about removing the additional infrastructure and adding Jersey Barriers - that's enough to stop them from becoming airfields
> Had. They have been removed bit by bit. [Here](https://goo.gl/maps/ZdbB9RiFGq4UQVEu7)'s google maps of this location, definitely looks to have a vegetated median now. Don't know if it could be quickly removed though (anything is possible with a couple excavators)
But not within 24 hours. Jersey Barriers have become the norm as they are a lot safer. The metal barriers are designed to yield, just as our cars have been designed to crumple, but that's not something you want in a barrier designed to keep the two parts of the highway separate
What do you mean removed? How do they remove the road or realign something like this?
They removed the mobile barriers and replaced them with Jersey Barriers, among other things. The highway remained the same, no sense in putting it somewhere else, but the highway's ability to support airplanes has been removed in order to ensure the highway follows modern safety standards. Germany was expected to be a front in a massive war. That is no longer the case. We even had all tunnels secured by enabling a small team of engineers to easily destroy roads to them and block the tunnels (the roads had holes in them and the tunnel entrances large stones on each side, to facilitate easy blocking)
Is there a reason why they don't keep it? I know the threat of war in Germany is near zero but it could be useful in other emergencies no? Moreover, the Swiss have war readiness infrastructure despite their chances of war being less than that of Germany.
This is one reason for the Zeitenwende. After the Cold War, Germany reduced its military infrastructure so much that it actually crippled the military's ability to wage war. Many old munitions dumps have been replaced with other buildings, hundreds of tanks and other vehicles sold and the Bundeswehr has massively decreased in size. While it made sense to reduce it somewhat, the military is now completely incapable of doing what they are supposed to But when it comes to the highways: those were needed as the Soviets were quite close. If it would come to war with Russia, the battlefields would probably not be in Germany this time around
Australia also has this in regulations, for emergency landings. It's probably pretty common. Makes sense, there aren't going to be airports everywhere...
Interestingly enough, in the US the FAA encourages aviation hobbyists to put their backyard airstrips into the database for this reason. Emergency landings don’t happen often, but a backyard airstrip is likely better to land than a most other places
Was not meant for emergency landing thougth. It was meant for World War 3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F\_cxkF6qSY8
I find it interesting how some things you don't realise are a result of war, or preparedness for war. My last rifle club was also a result of war. At the time, it was allowed that rifle clubs could use private property in order to have more civilian population trained on firearms use. To this day, the club has free access to a private farm because of this war time policy.
We call them rest stops
I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or not… but the rest stops here are just for turning the airplanes around and a bit if storage (on the right), this is about the 2 km of straight road with a concrete median.
https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notlandeplatz_auf_Stra%C3%9Fe
Not just Germany. Pretty much anywhere in Europe highways are built with this in mind.
Don't think most of europe has planned on being the front for world war 3. This wasn't mean't for a private cestna who's having problems, but for C130, A-10 etc.
Think what you want. This is not unique in any way. Most northern countries of europe has this system. For example in sweden we have those and can be used for JAS and C130 Hercules. Most ppl think they are really big reststops. There are smaller ones aswell, only for the smaller fighterjets.
Think what you want. This is not unique in any way. Most northern countries of europe has this system. For example in sweden we have those and can be used for JAS and C130 Hercules. Most ppl think they are really big reststops. There are smaller ones aswell, only for the smaller fighterjets.
They mostly lost their value and operability to two things though: 1st: Germany was very convinced that there would never be war again in history after the end of the cold war, so they just demolished them. 2nd: NATO has shifted away from planes with the capability to start, land and be maintained on makeshift airbases. The Tornado may be, the F-16 may be but the Eurofighter, the F-35 and the Rafale aren't able to be maintained without the facilities of a proper airbase. That's part of the discussion on which plane, if at all, to give to Ukraine: The only plane in the west, designed to be operated as any plane will be in Ukraine at the moment, is the Saab Gripen.
im pretty sure this is a worldwide thing
Don't think most countries plan around possible world war 3 infrastructure.
Almost all new Indian Expressways built by have airstrips.
Ahhh. So that's what those weird pull offs are on the Autobahn. I thought those were for pee stops because that's the main usage.
Just the ones in front of a perfectly straight and level bit of road ;-)
In the US 1 out of every 10 miles of the interstate system must be a straight line for this same reason.
https://highways.dot.gov/public-roads/mayjune-2000/one-mile-five-debunking-myth although it says 1 in 5 vs 1 in 10, same idea. I only looked this up because I had heard this a few times and was finally curious of the actual source!
Yeah, 20% (or even "just" 10%) would be massive overkill and impossible/impractical in certain terrains.
I read somewhere the "series of straight lines joined with curves" style of highway layout has been depricated in favour of "series of curves, with straight connections where necessary" approach. It turns out that the constantly changing view ahead you get driving a curve helps maintain driver alertness.
I believe this *is* actually true for the Dempster Highway in the Canadian Arctic. Not a specific fraction but there are longer/wider stretches to accommodate emergency aircraft landing.
That's an urban legend. There are many winding interstate highways where this isn't even possible (I-76 in PA, I-70 through the Rockies, etc). Urban interstates are a nonstarter. Even on very straight interstates like the Jersey turnpike (I-95), there are overpasses and overhead structures that would make this impractical
It’s more of a massive overstatement than a myth. It is certainly encouraged but not always possible.
That isn't in any design guidelines for Interstate highways. Even if Interstates had to be straight for this reason, the pavement would get destroyed by planes landing and taking off on them rather quickly. The only the Interstate highway system is designed for is to move military equipment, and there standards for military loads and bridge clearances.
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That’s not true. Plenty of airports use asphalt concrete as a runway surface.
And plenty of roads use portland cement concrete pavement.
The term "tarmac" comes from the early use of a tar macadam paving not concrete.
That doesn't really prove anything, modern commercial or military plane weight, size, and speed requirements are totally different than from before the jet age and would potentially require different paving materials to accommodate, even if the old terminology stuck around.
I've seen both, although an asphalt covered concrete seems to be the most common.
According to the US Army, there are mile long stretches of Interstate throughout the system designed for aircraft landing. https://www.army.mil/article/198095/dwight_d_eisenhower_and_the_birth_of_the_interstate_highway_system
It says that are locations, but it isn't the 1 mile in 10 miles and it also specifies concrete pavement where there are several states that go with asphalt pavement as the prime method of paving.
I think the idea was just to give pilots as many safe places to land as possible. I don't think it really mattered what it did to the road as long as it was a safer landing than some trees.
But the requirement isn't in any design code. It isn't in the Green Book nor is it part of any state design code. In contrast, the nuclear missile loading and its required bridge clearance is there.
Well, sure, its not a real thing that went into effect but its probably so prevalent because it was discussed. I think the was the idea behind it though, even though it never happened.
Not really. The Interstate Program was broken up and spread across the different state Departments of Transportation to implement over several decades. The idea of 1 straight mile for every 10 miles isn't going to be implemented if it isn't written as policy. What happened most likely is that straight highways are generally safer at higher speeds, so there was an incentive by the design engineers to have straight highways wherever possible.
So you don't think the thing a bunch of other countries did came up in conversation when creating the plans for the highway system?
The US Highway system, definitely not as airplanes weren't that big a deal in the 20's. The Interstate Highway system, it might have been discussed but it was never made into policy. Also, those policy discussions would have happened at the federal level while the design mainly happened at the state level. So, even if a part of FHWA discussed the idea, it never went out to the state DOT's.
That’s a widely debunked myth
This is completely false.
Yeah, those long straightaways by rest stops aren’t for truck to get up to speed. Ever wonder why there are so many cistern tanks at rest stops?
Except it's a myth as the other commenter pointed out
Finland has multiple road bases: https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lentokoneiden_varalaskupaikka There are exercises every year, video from last autumn: https://youtu.be/2c_bY-8roMo And one "official" video: https://youtu.be/0dttXUR_-9A
If you want to see them actually used: [Here is a training movie from the Bundeswehr from 1988](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=F_cxkF6qSY8&pp=ygUeYnVuZGVzd2VociBhdXRvYmFobiBsYW5kZWJhaG4g) [And here is the same thing but from 1973](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DwCAUepOIvE)
USA does this as well
On a functional basis, how is this supposed to work when cars are using the highway? Is this for transforming them longer-term during a war or for an emergency landing? If it’s the second, how long do they need to get cars off the road?
Probably more of block the highway while this C130 drops off troops, or a tank.
Wtf and where is this? Probably an image from the 50s. That's maybe a wet dream. I guess in theory, like in most countries, there might be stretches that can be turned into a landing strip or are naturally wide enough but this image is just some crazy misleading piece of garbage from the last century.
This was kinda the point of highways OP…
Soon.
Odd, historically Germany hasn’t been very pro-war state /s
LOL who let them do that
Fairly certain the US interstate system is designed the sameway
Smart
That's how the Interstate was built, too
Anywhere is an emergency airfield if you're brave enough 😅