Greek Motorways: The country’s “road Metro” has now emerged

The country’s “road Metro” is now a reality as Olympia, Ionian, Aegean and E65 Motorways along with Moreas, Egnatia, Attiki Odos and Rio-Antirrio Bridge create a considerably large network.

For the first time, drivers will be able to travel across long distances without having to exit the country’s covered motorway network. A major road axis and a sizeable contributor -in terms of kilometres- for the network, is Egnatia Odos, which, along with its 5 vertically connected motorways, features more than 1,300 km, making it one of Europe’s longest motorways.

With the completion of the aforementioned axes, the country now has more than 2,600 km of covered motorways.

Let’s break down the kilometres motorway by motorway:

– Nea Odos Motorway (Elefsina-Patra: 205 km),

– Ionian Motorway (Antirrio-Ioannina: 196 km),

– Aegean Motorway (Raches Maliakou- Klidi Imathias: 215 km),

– Egnatia Motorway (Igoumenitsa-Thessaloniki-Kipi: 670 km),

– Egnatia Motorway’s vertical axes (Thessaloniki-Evzoni: 70 km, Thessaloniki-Promahonas: 170 km, Thessaloniki-Kassandria: 130 km, Kozani-Niki: 100 km, Siatista-Krystallopigi: 80 km, Komotini-Borders: 24 km, Ardanio-Ormenio: 175 km),

– E65 Motorway (Xyniada-Trikala: 80 km),

– Rio-Antirrio Bridge (5 km),

– Attiki Motorway (Elefsina-Airport and Hymettus’ Ring Road: 65 km).

Undoubtedly, the integration and operation of these motorways open up major business opportunities regarding road transport, logistics, passengers’ transportation, tourism and trade in general.

Based on the country’s extent, Greece is considered to an adequate and high-standard road network that can become the foundation of its development and reinvigoration, given that the network will shorten transport time of people and goods drastically.

Especially if we take under consideration the completion of the E65 Motorway (Lamia-Egnatia) gradually by 2021, Patras-Pyrgos and Thessaloniki’s Ring Road, then we will be talking for a really dense road network, linking the South with the North and the East with the West, providing multiple alternatives indeed, while it will offer numerous road connections with with our northern

Additional links to ports and airports will create an “express” corridor, mainly towards Central and Western Europe, opening great business opportunities for the logistics industry. This network will certainly give the country an invaluable opportunity to form and commodify a product that will attract global players, activated in transportation, thus creating many jobs and utilizing regions that are currently off the map.

Nikos Karagiannis-ypodomes.com

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