Trans-African road
The
Tripoli?Cape Town Highway
or
TAH 3
is
Trans-African Highway
3 in the transcontinental
road
network being developed by the
United Nations Economic Commission for Africa
(UNECA), the
African Development Bank
(AfDB), and the
African Union
. The route has a length of 10,808 km (6,716 mi) and has the longest missing links and requires the most new road construction.
South Africa was not originally included in the route which was first planned in the
Apartheid
era, but it is now recognized that it would continue to Cape Town. It may still be referred to in documents as the
Tripoli-Windhoek Highway
because of this fact.
It is meant to be the second link between North and Southern Africa, with the
Cairo-Cape Town Highway
being the other route, passing through
East Africa
.
Route
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The route passes through
Libya
,
Chad
,
Cameroon
,
Central African Republic
(CAR),
Republic of the Congo
(ROC), the western tip of the
Democratic Republic of the Congo
(DRC),
Angola
,
Namibia
and
South Africa
. Only national paved roads in
Libya
,
Cameroon
,
Angola
,
Namibia
and
South Africa
can be used to any extent. Currently only desert tracks run from southern
Libya
to the vicinity of
Ndjamena
, a distance of more than 2000 km, and no track of any kind exists between Salo, CAR and
Ouesso
, ROC.
Northern section
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The
Tripoli?Cape Town Highway
is not a high priority in its northern section across the
Sahara
between Tripoli and Ndjamena, for which the Trans-Sahara Highway further west would probably find more usage and which provides an alternative north?south route.
Libya
is said to be more interested in road links to
Niger
which would connect with the Trans-Sahara Highway. Coupled with lawlessness and the potential for instability in the Libya-Chad border regions, the northern section is likely to be the last to be developed and may be a couple of decades away from completion.
Central section
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It is the central section between northern Angola and Cameroon which is most needed because it would provide the first paved link between the
West African
and
Southern African
regions, and it would do the most to stimulate trade which currently has to go by air or sea. The central section is however a 'missing link', and the planned alignment between CAR and ROC would pass through some of the most remote and difficult terrain and rainforests of the
Sangha River
basin. This alignment has the potential for an enormous environmental impact on relatively untouched forest within a number of nature reserves.
An alternative alignment for the road has been proposed between
Yaounde
, Cameroon and
Brazzaville
, ROC, which would do more to facilitate transport between the south and west of the continent, and which would probably have less of an environmental impact. It would run via
Lambarene
(
Gabon
), and
Dolisie
(ROC), and this route has already been paved as far south as
Ndende
, near the
Congo
border, meanwhile paving the rest is under way.
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From the south, traffic going to West Africa would branch off in Yaounde onto the western section of the
Lagos-Mombasa Highway
, while traffic going east and north would share the paved road from Yaounde to Garoua-Boulai on the Cameroon-CAR border. As well as being shorter for traffic between south and west, this alternative alignment has other advantages: it already carries a little international traffic, it runs through more populated and economically active areas, it adds Gabon (and its capital,
Libreville
, via a spur) to the network, and it passes very close to
Equatorial Guinea
(Rio Muni) and the Atlantic ports of
Douala
and
Pointe-Noire
. Furthermore, a greater proportion of this section is paved, and those sections which are gravel roads or earth tracks are important as national roads and so are higher priorities for paving.
Between Dolisie and
Matadi
an alternative mainly paved route is also available through Pointe-Noire and
Cabinda
, crossing the Congo River at the
Matadi Bridge
, instead of by ferry between Brazzaville and
Kinshasa
.
Southern section
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The southern section between
DRC
and
Cape Town
on the other hand is an important regional road in the
Southern African Development Community
(SADC).
The Route follows south on the N1 highway in the
DRC
. It enters
Angola
through the EN140 and follows south through to the EN120 and enters the
B1
in
Namibia
. The route continues to follow South and connects into
South Africa
using the
N7
highway. The highway continues south until it interchanges with the
N1
and
M7
highways in
Cape Town
.
Paving of existing roads is required in northern Angola but from Ngage through
Angola
,
Namibia's B1 road
and
South Africa's N7 highway
to
Cape Town
is fully paved and is in a fair to good condition.
See also
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References
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