European E-roads

[Chris]

wikipedia entry

The European E-roads is an international network of signed routes. Similar to the Interstate Highway system, the E-road system is also layed out in a grid network, and also covers portions of Asia, such as Central Asia, all the former USSR republics.

Most countries sign E-roads besides their own numbering network, though some countries, most notably in Scandinavia and Belgium sign E-roads only, and only have an administrative nationwide numbering. In Belgium, when a freeway doesn't have an E-number, the national number is signed.

E-routes are not signed in the United Kingdom at all. It's also a question to which extend E-routes are signed in countries like Russia and Kazakhstan.

Most importantly, not all E-routes are freeways! Especially in Eastern Europe, where freeways are not that common as in western Europe, E-routes follow national roads. E-routes can also follow ferry routes, since Europe doesn't have a very good shape for a grid-numbering.

The numbering system;
North-south routes have two digit numbers ending at 5, going upwards from west to east.
East-west routes have two digit numbers ending at 0, going upwards from north to south.
Less important main routes have odd numbers for north-south routes, and even numbers for east-west routes.
Secondary routes have three digits, and are often located within a country, without crossing borders.
There are also secondary routes in central asia that are numbered from 001 to 099.

The actual usage of E-numbers may vary from country to country. They are well established in Belgium, where they are often better known than the Belgian A-numbering of freeways. They are also well established in countries like Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland.
Other countries only sign it as a secondary numbering, and less prominent, and are also often obsolete on signs. I doubt if they are actually much used in countries like France, Spain or Germany.

This is an E-road number:


E-roads in mighty Germany.


E-roads in Poland.

[treichard]

Are changes to the E road system, such as new routes or deleted routes, posted online anywhere? 

[Bickendan]

I think the E-routes are more akin to the US route system than the Interstate system, though the E-routes have a preference of using motorways whenever possible. For example, in Spain, as the motorways get built, the E-routes get moved over to the new motorway segments (E70 along A8, E15 along A[P]7).

As far as Russian and the 'Stans, you're right that it's unclear who signs what -- not even Google's sure. If memory serves, I read that E30 runs at least all the way to Omsk, but Google doesn't even try to show it past Ukraine, when it could at least to Moskva.
Bing does a better job with E40, both with the map quality and with signing E40 at least partway through the northernmost 'Stan.

[Chris]

E40 runs to Ridder, Kazakhstan. Although I highly doubt if they are signed in Central Asia. Recently a new batch of E00x numbers were introduced in Central Asia as well.

I know for sure E60 is signed in Georgia:

(this is S1, the only "freeway" in Georgia)

[treichard]

My understanding (is it right?) is that UNECE decided on the general routes by the cities they connect and selected the numbers they receive:
http://www.unece.org/trans/conventn/ECE-TRANS-SC1-384e.pdf (2008, latest I can find)
Probably it was done with much input from the involved countries.

Then each country's highway ministry decides on the details of the routings to accomplish connecting the cities. When a new freeway is built along an E Road corridor, that highway ministry would usually move the E route to the new freeway, and the UNECE route definition is general enough not to need a change.

But when a new E route is added to or removed from the system, that should be UNECE's call?

The specific question that makes me ask is that I noticed that E641 (southwestward from Salzburg) has vanished on some 2010 versions of maps that showed it in 2009.  I wanted to find out if it was a curiously widespread mapping error or if the route was scrapped from the official E road network. I haven't yet found the answer on the UNECE web site.

[english si]

Interestingly, while they had very little intention of signing them, in 1967 the UK submitted and got a lot of routes added. It was purely to get an inset on the map, like part of West German got, to show "It's happening here". The new system simplified and lessened the system in the UK (no 3digit routes, for instance).

There's even less intention of signing them now, and they have lots of fun anomalies, such as the E05 ending in Southampton, when the ferry to Le Havre (where the route ends on the continent) goes from Portsmouth.

Edit: here's my rather crappy map of where I think the Euroroutes in Great Britain and Ireland go today:



Obviously a list of places each route links exists, but not the route data. Euroroute numbers are in red simply as it makes them show up.

Galway isn't a big city, but it's bigger than Derry and Craigavon, which have Euroroutes. Likewise, over the Irish Sea Aberdeen, Plymouth and the SW miss out (as do the major passenger port of Portsmouth and the large urban areas relating to Bournemouth and Brighton).

[Bickendan]

Wikipedia mentioned that Ireland has started to sign the E-routes. Is this true?

[english si]

Yes, Ireland is signing the E-routes when either building new motorway, or when changing the signage, due to widening or redesignation as motorway (both of which have happened a lot recently)

[Scott5114]

Does anyone actually use the E designations?

[agentsteel53]

Does anyone actually use the E designations?

Norway certainly does - a lot of the most important routes appear to be signed only as E.

[J N Winkler]

France, Spain, and Switzerland co-sign them heavily and Sweden has long lengths of road for which the E-number is the only one signed.  Denmark also signs them, but not (I think) to the exclusion of national road numbers.  My memory (which may be wrong) is that German and Italian signing is reticent about E-numbers.  In Britain the legal option to sign E-routes was abolished in 1994 and, to my knowledge, no E-routes were signed before 1994.  (The British E-route confirmatory sign was a standalone sign containing just the E-number and the corresponding motorway route number, which had been introduced in the Anderson report but carried forward into TSRGD 1964 along with the Worboys signs.  There has never been an option for signing E-routes off the motorway network.)

[Chris]

In practice, people only use it when the E-numbers are the only ones signed (Scandinavia, Belgium, Serbia), however in all other countries nobody ever refers to E-numbers. I bet most people don't even know where E-numbers run. Traffic information, temporary signs, VMS's, news, etc all refer to the national numbers.

In my opinion, the E-route system is an epic fail and should be used for administrative purposes only. It also saves some clutter on the signs.

[Truvelo]

I wouldn't go as far to say that E numbers are an epic fail. In places like Benelux where there are lots of small countries close together they are useful for long journeys, especially as each country has it's own A1, A2, A3 etc so when you cross the border the road number will change. I would even suggest that the A numbers are completely removed leaving just the E numbers so when I make my annual journey from Calais to Aachen there is just one number I need to follow - E40

This above only works in contiguous areas. Where E numbers don't work is in countries that are separate from the European mainland such as UK, Ireland, Iceland etc. I think the recent decision for Ireland to start showing E numbers is a complete waste of time and money.

[agentsteel53]

are there continuations of A-routes across country lines?  Here in the US, there is the occasional route that keeps its number - for example 92 from Wyoming to Nebraska to Iowa to Illinois.

[Chris]

It is rare, but it does happen sometimes. This happens more often in countries that were once one country, for example all Caucasus republics and Central Asia have continuous road numbers. The Serbian M1 becomes the Macedonian M1, which in it's turn becomes the Greek A1. The German A4 becomes the Polish A4 and the Czech D2 becomes the Slovak D2. This also happens with a lot of E-routes in Scandinavia (although the E-routes are generally limited in Scandinavia due to geography). I'm not sure if the Bulgarian A3 becomes the Turkish O-3.

[agentsteel53]

The German A4 becomes the Polish A4

I bet they have fond memories of the joyful time when the Polish A4 was a German autobahn!

[english si]

I would even suggest that the A numbers are completely removed leaving just the E numbers so when I make my annual journey from Calais to Aachen there is just one number I need to follow - E40

Given that's mostly in Belgium, the national numbers aren't really shown, or known, you pretty much have that. A26-E40-whatever for the little bit in Germany isn't so hard (no more hard than my journey to Wolverhampton yesterday - local roads, M25, M1, M6, local roads and returning on M6, M5, M42, M40 (though not quite as simple as that, due to closures and detours for fun) - with E roads and suppression of national numbers that would have been E30-E13-E24-M6 and M6-M5-M42-E05-M40).

Given that E numbers are given equal prominence in France as the A/N numbers, you can just follow E40 anyway on the A26.

Giving a UK example (simply because I know it better), it would seem odd to have the M1 as two stretches - one inside the M25, the other in Yorkshire would make London-Leeds harder using numbers. Likewise the M42 being in two bits (south and north east of Birmingham) would make doing Bristol-Yorkshire harder.

Then again, Continental Europe prefers navigation by place than numbers, and the UK has a halfway house - a mix of both big numbers, and a decent system of places to navigate by.

[treichard]

Is zero-padding used on the posted E numbers along the Asian E001-E019 routes?

I know they drop the zeros on E01-E09 in France, Spain, and Scandinavia but not in Portugal (thanks, Google Street View), but I've been unsuccessful in determining if E001 shows up as E1 or E001 in Georgia and Armenia, for example.