Road Numbering Changes

[kphoger]

And to think that when I saw "transit routes" I was thinking of buses.

Me too.  But it does make sense as "in transit".

[Chris]

Yeah, the usage of 'transit' for public transport is pretty much unknown in Europe, even translations to English will likely not use that word. Transit usually refers to long-distance traffic / through traffic in European languages.

Back in the early 2000s when freeway systems had gaps in them, some countries would put up signs with 'transit' or 'tranzit' to direct long-distance traffic through a town or city.

[Jhoan Seb]

https://wiki.aaroads.com/wiki/Roads_and_motorways_in_Cyprus#1980s After reviewing some of my sources, I corrected some misinformation from Cyprus article. I thought they introduced road numbering in the 1970s, but no.

The World Bank created a proper road numbering in 1987 with collaboration of British engineers; the project was called Road Maintenance Management System (RMMS).

I'm currently checking some of the old Road Maps and they don't present numbering in 1973
https://onlineshop.oxfam.org.uk/survey-of-cyprus-administration-and-road-map-1973/product/HD_304067649?sku=HD_304067649

[Chris]

The World Bank has a really good archive of their works going back across the 20th century. I've found a number of documents that confirmed route numbering in former French colonies in Africa going back to the 1960s or 1970s, for example routes nationales were defined in Mali in 1971.

[Jhoan Seb]

I recently created the article on the Pangu Highway on AARW, a historic project connecting Port Moresby (the capital of Papua New Guinea) and Lae (the country's second-most populous city).

Check it out here: https://wiki.aaroads.com/wiki/Pangu_Highway

But while I was looking for more information about roads in the country, I noticed that Papua New Guinea passed legislation in 2025 defining a proper road numbering system for the country.

https://storage.works.gov.pg/prod/articles/20260320080920_gazette_no_g346-2025_classification_of_national_roads.pdf?v=20260320080920

Gazette No. G346 is most recent document about road numbering system in the country. The Coastal Highway, which connects the northeastern tip to the Indonesian border at Wutung (near Jayapura), was designated as NR0009, but a renumbering has been proposed. It's actually a bit confusing, as it's unclear whether the Department of Works and Highways has ratified it.

https://works.gov.pg/articles/view/redevelopment-of-route-600-ways-after-30-years-%E2%80%93-hiritano-highway-receives-two-massive-road-maintenance-contract-on-eve-of-50th-golden-jubilee-celebrations

> The Redevelopment of the Hiritano Highway marks a 3-decade road maintenance drought along this stretch of the highway which according to the works road asset management records of national roads this highway in the inventory is number 001 out of the sixteen national highways in PNG.

Also see: https://works.gov.pg/pages/national-roads-registry

[Jhoan Seb]

> The Finnish National Road Administration (Finnra) has been responsible for the implementation of a road asset management system (RAMS) project in Papua New Guinea since October 1998. The project is financed through a grant by the Asian Development Bank and will be completed in September 2000.

> RAMS adopted the road-numbering convention used by DoW, which is well understood throughout the country.
From: https://onlinepubs.trb.org/Onlinepubs/conf/2000/cp23/cp23-027.pdf
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https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/262651468775145760/pdf/multi0page.pdf#page=62 <- 2002 Document with Route Numbers
https://www.dfat.gov.au/sites/default/files/png-transport-sector-design-and-implementation-framework-annexes.pdf#page=13 <- 2013 Document with Route Numbers
------------
Also I found a copy of the 2020 Roads Act in the Wayback Machine.

https://web.archive.org/web/20210814063904/https://www.parliament.gov.pg/uploads/acts/20A_41.pdf

[Jhoan Seb]

https://openjicareport.jica.go.jp/pdf/10299816_02.pdf?#page=24


- Old Road Numbering for Panama and Panama Oeste Provinces (1982)

[Jhoan Seb]

The World Bank has a really good archive of their works going back across the 20th century. I've found a number of documents that confirmed route numbering in former French colonies in Africa going back to the 1960s or 1970s, for example routes nationales were defined in Mali in 1971.

After digging a bit in the World Bank Document Library, I found this document about route numbering in Panama.

https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/453541468285323112/pdf/multi-page.pdf#page=53
> First number is number of H. D. M. analysis sheet. First digit of second number refers to the province (2=Cocle, 3=Colon, 4=Chiriqui,6=Herrera, 7-Los Santos, 8=Panama, 9=Veraguas), while subsequent digits are sequential identification numbers.

I talked with some people in Panama and they said that the regional routes first digit, it's a reference to the province . It's kinda great that I have proper source and year about the road numbering change. I know Panama started to use route numbers in the 1960s but it didn't know when they switched to this regional system.