Historical photos of motorways and roads in your country

[brisavoine]

As promised yesterday, here is the rest of the N7 from Lyon to the Mediterranean.



After Central Lyon you had to cross some grizzly industrial suburbs (Saint-Fons, Vénissieux, Feyzin) before finally reaching the open countryside. You were now going due south along the Rhône River valley, travelling next to the old Roman road that linked Lyon (Lugdunum), capital of Gaul, with Rome, capital of the Roman Empire.



The first city you crossed south of Lyon was Vienne, which was a very important city at the end of the Roman Empire. The N7 passed by a monument called the Pyramid, which archaelogists believe was located inside the circus of Vienne (horse races that is). That monument gave its name to one of France's most famous restaurants, La Pyramide, located on the N7. La Pyramide got its three stars in the Michelin Guide in 1933. From Charles Trénet to Charlie Chaplin, all the rich and famous of these days stopped at La Pyramide on their way to the Mediterranean.

That's the Pyramid monument in Vienne:


In Pont-de-l'Isère you crossed the Isère River on a bridge built in 1827 (here in the foreground, with the south towards the left).



In Pont-de-l'Isère you also crossed (and the motorway which runs parallel to the N7 still does cross) the 45th parallel, which means you were (and still are if you take the Autoroute du Soleil) exactly half-way between the Equator and the North Pole.

In the 1950s the authorities of Pont de l'Isère erected a monument right on the 45th parallel, on the side of the N7. On one side of the monument was written "Ici commence le Midi" (i.e. "Here starts the South"). The monument is now abandonned, the N7 having been deviated and most people taking the motorway anyway. Here is the monument:



After Pont-de-l'Isère you reached the city of Valence and drove through the city center.



After Valence the climate and the vegetation started to change. You were now really entering "le Midi" (i.e. "the South"): the Rhône valley was becoming larger, orchards could be seen everywhere. In Livron you crossed the Drôme River on a bridge built in the end of the 18th century.



You then reached Montélimar whose traffic jams during summer holidays were a well-known nightmare until the motorway opened in the beginning of the 1970s. On the shaded boulevards, some ladies would walk between cars stuck in the traffic jams and try to sell to unfortunate motorists the famous delicacy of Montélimar, the nougats (a confection made from a sugar or honey paste into which nuts are mixed).





South of Montélimar you crossed the canal of Donzère-Montdragon, an engineering marvel built in 1953 to tame the Rhône and provide water for France's first nuclear complex, of which French authorities at the time were extremely proud (the symbol of a modernizing France after the tragedy of WW2).



South of Montélimar you crossed the border with Provence and arrived in Orange, the first Provençal city on the road, where the N7 passed right by the beautiful Roman arch of triumph erected 2000 years ago. No doubt, you had really arrived in the Mediterranean world!





South of Orange you reached Avignon, the capital of the Popes during the Middle Ages, and the N7 passed near the city walls of the medieval city.



Just outside of Avignon you crossed the Durance River on a bridge rebuilt in 1954.



Orchards were (and still are) everywhere, providing fruits daily for the big metropolis of Paris 700 km to the north. Here a Berliet truck from the Parisian transport company Mighirian in the 1960s near Avignon, ready to take fresh fruits and vegetables to Paris where they'll be sold at Les Halles wholesale food market the next morning.



The N7 crossing the village of Orgon just outside Cavaillon (a name that evokes images of Provence and sunshine).



Finally you reached Aix-en-Provence, the historical capital of Provence, with the N7 arriving at the Place de la Rotonde ("Rotunda Square"), which has now been renamed the Place Charles de Gaulle.



Here ended your southward journey: the N7 circled around the fountain and took the Boulevard Victor Hugo due east towards the Italian border (leaving Marseille south of Aix-en-Provence which the N7 didn't cross).

A few kilometres east of Aix-en-Provence the N7 passed at the feet of the very famous Montagne Saint-Victoire, painted many times by Cézanne.



In the village of Tourves, between Saint-Maximim-la-Sainte-Beaume and Brignoles, the N7 was only 4 meter-wide, and two trucks could not pass each other!



You then crossed the sunny town of Brignoles.



The N7 right after Brignoles. The N7 was enlarged in the 1960s. To the left is the original N7 as it stood before the 1960s, and to the right is the N7 built in the 1960s.



You then crossed Vidauban. It's hard to see on the picture, but the street to the right is actually the D48 road, and the sign on the building actually says "Saint-Tropez"!! Way to go if you wanted to reach Saint-Tropez, otherwise if you continued straight you would reach Nice after a couple more hours. After seeing this Saint-Tropez sign, no doubt, you were really on holidays.



Continuing straight on the N7, you arrived after about 25 km in the ancient Roman port city of Fréjus. This is the first time that you were actually seeing the Mediterranean Sea since you had left Paris!



In Fréjus, the N7 ran next to the Via Augusta (the road from Rome to Marseille and Lyon).



After Fréjus you had to cross the Estérel mountain range, perhaps the most beautiful mountain range in France, with the N7 cutting its way between the mountain and the sea. The motorway now completely bypasses this beautiful area, and it's not as beautiful as driving on the old N7.



There are no less than 183 turns on the N7 as it crosses the Estérel moutain range, and since the motorway was opened in 1960, few people still drive these 183 turns. Before the motorway was opened, all the traffic went through that road, and it was almost impossible to pass cars due to the many turns, so it was a long traffic jam before reaching Cannes.



And finally, having crossed the Estérel, you arrived in Cannes, driving on the famous Croisette seaside boulevard where movie stars make famous appearances during the Cannes Film Festival. The Croisette was the only way to cross Cannes, there were no bypasses or motorways till 1960. You can see the Croisette and the Carlton Hotel on the picture.



After Cannes the N7 crossed Juan-les-Pins, the place where Napoleon landed in 1815 on his attempt to get back in power. The picture shows the N7 crossing Juan-les-Pins in 1963.



A few kilometers after Juan-les-Pins you crossed the Var River, which until 1860 marked the border between France and Piedmont-Sardinia, and then on the other bank of the Var River you finally reached Nice, entering the city by driving on the world-renowned Promenade des Anglais.





After Nice you basically had to cross the Alps as they plunge into the Mediterranean, the so-called Maritime Alps, to reach the Italian border, and this was (and still is) a spectacular journey. There were two roads to cross the Maritime Alps. One was the Grande Corniche ("Great Corniche"), the other was the Moyenne Corniche ("Middle Corniche"). The Grande Corniche is probably the most famous road in Europe. It is the road you see very often in TV commercials for luxury cars. The Grande Corniche was built by Napoleon I who had noticed how difficult it was to move troops from France to Italy during the French campaign in Italy in 1796 when his troops had to cross the Maritime Alps on the back of mules (there existed no road at the time).

The Grande Corniche is the highest above the Mediterranean, it's narrow and curvy, so between WW1 and WW2 the French authorities built the Moyenne Corniche, which is closer to sea-level, wider, and less curvy, but also less scenic than the mythical Grande Corniche. The N7 was going on the Grande Corniche till the Moyenne Corniche was built, then it was the Moyenne Corniche which became the N7.

Here is the Grande Corniche in the beginning of the 20th century.



The Grande Corniche goes more than 500 meters above sea-level, providing magnificent views of the Mediterranean. Here above the village of Eze.



At La Turbie, above Monaco, the Grande Corniche passed by the so called Trophy of Augustus, erected right on the border between Italy and Gaul by Emperor Augustus 20 centuries ago in the honor of his two grandsons .



The Moyenne Corniche is a bit less spectacular, but quite scenic nonetheless. This picture was taken from the Grande Corniche above the village of Eze, and the viaduct you can see below is the Moyenne Corniche.



The Moyenne Corniche in the 1960s near Monaco, with a tunnel carved in the rock of the mountain.



French tourists on the Moyenne Corniche just before Monaco in 1951.





Both corniches met in Menton, and just after Menton the N7 arrived at the border. End of the N7. Just after the building in the middle of the road starts l'Italia!



Sometimes I wish motorways had never been built. Travelling back then was more fun, more like a real journey...



I gathered pictures and information on this website if you want to find out more about the Nationale 7:
http://www.nationale7.com/

And for our Dutch readers ():



And our francophone readers:

[RS.ban]

wow great!!!! fantastic report!
how long is N7 and how much time did u need from Paris to Nice?

[brisavoine]

I never drove it. LOL. But I know several of these places. Driving the N7 from Paris to Nice in the 1950s would have taken two days I imagine. Today there is the motorway (which still takes 8 hours and a half from Paris to Nice at 130 km/h), but even the N7 has been greatly improved since the 1950s, with deviations and beltways around towns and cities, so it wouldn't take as long as in the 1950s to drive from Paris to Nice on the N7 today.

Concerning the length of the N7, it was 996 km (it must have changed now, since they have modified the road in many places). Actually there's a French card game called Mille Bornes (i.e. "One thousand kilometers" in French slang) whose name comes from the length of the N7: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mille_Bornes

[Verso]

Wow, great report, thanks for taking your time, brisavoine! I love these pics, it must've been a great journey back then.

[PLH]

Warsaw, the 70's

[Timon91]

Nice pics, PLH
I'd like to see some pics of the old A2 in the Netherlands. Does anyone have those?

[Turnovec]

Bulgaria from the 1970's ...


This is the road Varna-Golden Sands [I-9], the first one is the interchange at Spirka "Pochivka" and the 2nd onr - the interchange for St. Konstantin & Helena resort.

image hosted on flickr


image hosted on flickr




This is the right bridge of Vitinia viaduct, part of Hemus Motorway [A2]

image hosted on flickr

[paF4uko]

The first picture is Počivka interchange as I told you in the thread about Bulgarian motorways. Edit the label.
Btw, where did you get those from?

[J N Winkler]

Originally Posted by ChrisZwolle

And it lacks shoulders. I read the Netherlands was the first country in the world to construct shoulders at all motorways.

Technically the M1 did have hard shoulders when it opened on 2 November 1959. However, motorway hard shoulders at that time consisted of material which was stabilized to support the weight of large vehicles, and were intended to be covered with grass. (Americans call this type of shoulder "stabilized vegetated.") The standards were later changed to require a full paved hard shoulder when it was observed that people who pulled to the side and tried to change a flat tire could not tell where the hard shoulder ended and the verge began. The hard shoulder could support the weight of a jack, while the verge could not.

[ChrisZwolle]

Actually, the Dutch A12 was opened in 1936 with shoulders.

[J N Winkler]

Were they paved and, if so, with what? What was the structural section?

[ChrisZwolle]

It's not clear. The driving lanes had concrete slabs and the shoulder was "paved" and 2.5 meters wide. It is said to be the first in the world. Nowadays, Dutch shoulders are 3 - 3.5 meters wide.

Note that another section of A12 which opened in 1937 had bricks as pavement! (A concession to the brick industry of that time, and the fact the roadbed was not really consolidated yet. The region had clay with moor underneath it, so every roadbed just dissapeared after a while in the moors...

[Turnovec]

Originally Posted by paF4uko

The first picture is Počivka interchange as I told you in the thread about Bulgarian motorways. Edit the label.
Btw, where did you get those from?

Done! And here's the source -> http://www.flickr.com/photos/3962536...7604514292390/

[paF4uko]

Thanks, Turnovec. It all looks so ordered... I know it was imposed by fear of the state's repressive mechanisms, but still... I'd like people to be more conscious and impose the order themselves. Now it's complete anarchy...

[dia]

It was not imposed by the regime, not at the level you seem to think at least... It makes you visualise how terrible were the late years of communism and the anarchy after them for the population.

Great pictures from everywhere, I didn't know about this thread before- it's fantastic!

[paF4uko]

What I mean is that everything was controlled by the state, even people's attitude. Anyway, it's not the right thread for this... If you want to discuss it so badly, send me a private message.

[x-type]

what cars were the most often at bulgarian roads in communist times?

[paF4uko]

Žigula, Lada, Moskvič, Trabant, Škoda, Volga, Wartburg...

[Mateusz]

No Fiat 125 or Lada ?

[Turnovec]

Originally Posted by Mateusz

No Fiat 125 or Lada ?

You mean polish FIAT ? We had of those too

There were some mercedes benz , alfa romeo, bmw etc. luxury cars, but only for the people from the higher circles of the party