Countries with Best Roads, Infrastructure

[4K8KW10]

Hi there,

Well, I have visited many countries including the UK, the US, The Netherlands, Germany, Czech Slovakia, Austria Hungary, Serbia, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Turkey...

I have noticed that the roads in some NATO member states which tend to ne under very strong US policy influence, for instance Western Germany (in particular east of the Dutch-German border, around Frankfurt-am-Main, Darmstadt), Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria are in quite poor condition, holes in the asphalt layer, rusty mantinels everywhere, etc.
In others, like Austria and Hungary, the roads are relatively good.

The best roads I saw in The Netherlands, something like these:




So, what is the reason that some governments don't spend resources for proper infrastructure?
Why would it be some nations policy the relatively low priority for this basic society need?

 

[4K8KW10]

If you get onto minor roads and rural areas, the road quality in Hungary is generally quite poor. Badly lit and badly signposted too.

This.
Especially dangerous at nights without full Moon or snow, and in rainy and foggy conditions, at these times, it gets nearly impossible to drive safely. The lights from the coming in the opposite direction cars make matters even worse

 

[4K8KW10]

i've always found the roads in france to be excellent (for the most part). that said, I am comparing them to 3rd World Northern Ireland roads so maybe take my opinion with a pinch of salt!

Can you please share photos of roads in 3rd World Northern Ireland?

 

[4K8KW10]

Quite a few things shape the quality of roads - some countries have relatively low population while access to higher levels of income per person than others which always helps to maintain infrastructure especially if they are some shape of social democracy, etc. then things like cultural mindset and so on come into it.

Decent and quality transport infrastructure is a requirement for working economy, it is not only a consequence of high standard and high incomes.
Countries where strongly invest in quality, have much bigger chances for economic growth.

They've just resurfaced the roads around me and in the process of doing the rest of the town (though layout, etc. is still lacking) it will be interesting to see how it turns out in the long run - looks like they've actually used decent materials this time - the last time after just a few months the surface looked like the moon.

Can you please share photos of then and now?

 

[4K8KW10]

You mentioned Germany....
I understood they spent an absolute fortune on their infra.

Germany no longer spends money on infrastructure. Try travelling from The Netherlands to Germany and once crossing the virtual border, you will fall in second tier, second quality second world territory. I said rusty mantinels everywhere, roads with asphalt holes in major cities like Darmstadt, etc.

Certainly all the Germans we have here tell stories of how all the utilities must be laid in the correct positions (ie gas down the left, water down the right, telecoms down the middle sort of thing) and there are serious fines for getting it wrong. They also spend stupid money fixing even the slightest of Grade 2 cracked pipes, where we wouldn't touch it at least until it hit Grade 5 (ie had fallen flat)...!!

This how it has to be.
But the roads system in the UK in general looks more sophisticated than in Germany.

Let's try to put the countries in different tiers:

First tier: The Netherlands, Japan, UAE, South Korea;
Second tier: The UK, France, Austria, Switzerland;
Third tier: Germany, Hungary*, Czech Republic, Russia, Greece
Forth tier: Poland, Slovakia, Serbia, Romania, Bulgaria, Macedonia.

*Hungary has very good highways and very good asphalt in cities and towns. Outside of Budapest, roads to smaller villages and places for leisure are of lower quality

So, do you think this standings is right?

 

[4K8KW10]

you'd need to come visit to understand what I mean. photo's would do them justice!

This is a photo of a road to a hotel in South - East Europe where many UK tourists go every winter

 

[4K8KW10]

Japan has heated roads for winter!

Several years ago, I saw a news article about The Netherlands and their attempt to prototype such (solar) roads there, too.

In Portugal all the toll roads are perfect. Supposedly the EU funded a lot of them but the locals are too stingy to pay a toll so only tourists use them, meaning they're super quiet and like new!

Portugal and Spain are ok, too. Not as shiny as The Netherlands but still excellent.

Looks like the roads last time I was in Redhill, but with smaller potholes!!

Can you imagine how much damage these holes do to the cars' suspension?! These cars need to go for repair all the time.

 

[4K8KW10]

Our roads are an absolute embarrassment.

What do your politicians say about it?
Ours here are terrible a**holes which say they don't have money, and have no willingness at all to find money.
But... even I can find money with different EU funds and projects, the World Bank also supports infrastructure projects.

 

[4K8KW10]

They promise more money for it, but it's not nearly enough. When you do the maths on the headline figures it works out to the most piddly amounts for each of the local councils, so it's not a wonder they all just do cheap patching jobs. There's more money for major infrastructure like motorways, but at a local level things are just terrible.

Well, here, in towns and cities it is relatively good, the same with major infrastructure, they do indeed work on the motorways.
The problem is the condition of the infrastructure between smaller towns and cities, including economy-tourism-critical resorts and places of National importance. These get no funding at all, and we don't even get any promises, the politicians just force us to forget about these issues.

 

[4K8KW10]

The best roads I have seen was in Southern Spain around the Andalucia region. Billiard board smooth roads without any potholes. Such as this as a random example.

One of the problems in this country is that the services run under the roads so as soon as a new road is laid, it's being dug up again.

Yup, so familiar. The communication services run under the pedestrian walkways, but the water pipes / sewage run directly under the roads and even when someone needs to connect to these, the road gets dug up and then recovered again

 

[4K8KW10]

Yep, and it seems to be getting gradually worse each year. Despite the mild winter and lack of freezing. I have never seen the roads in such poor state with so many disentergrating pot holes. With no attempt to even patch.

The low quality of the base layer under the asphalt layer and presence of too much moisture, even without heavier conditions like snow and everyday freeze/melt, is the reason for the potholes.
There should be a universal global standard, probably the best would be if written by the Dutch or Japanese, and then acccepted everywhere else.

A pothole is a structural failure in a road surface, caused by failure primarily in asphalt pavement due to the presence of water in the underlying soil structure and the presence of traffic passing over the affected area.[1] Introduction of water to the underlying soil structure first weakens the supporting soil. Traffic then fatigues and breaks the poorly supported asphalt surface in the affected area. Continued traffic action ejects both asphalt and the underlying soil material to create a hole in the pavement.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pothole

 

[4K8KW10]

What country is that? People going skiing in Bulgaria or something?

Yes. How did you guess? Have you been in this exact place?

 

[4K8KW10]

Mexico and the U.S. have so vast territories that I guess it is kind of normal that potholes appear and don't get repaired anytime soon.

Well, I have seen in the Baltic countries (heritage from the USSR), roads not covered with the last layer of asphalt, only very hard pressed soil, the roads are wide and very smooth without any potholes, too.
The only thing is that multiple tiny pebbles hit the mudguards and the tyres all the time.

 

[4K8KW10]

I think the UK must have some of the worst roads in the entire solar system. I was watching a road patching team in our area the other week and didn't know whether to laugh or cry, I wish now I had taken a video to upload to YouTube. This team put a couple of cones around the pothole, proceeded to use a stiff brush to clear away the debris then opened a bag of 'cold asphalt' emptied it into the pothole and used a tamper to firm it in. That was it, job done, onto next hole. Within 4 days the pothole was reforming - what a waste of time, effort and money.

This is, definitely, not the way how it must be done.
Here, at least, they do it better (when they do it, of course). They cut the asphalt with some saw in square or rectangular shapes, then fill the proper shaped holes with new asphalt, and then use some type of glue on all edges, so water never gets again in between. The patches last for a considerable amount of time.

shouldn't road tax go on road?

Road taxes must go for repair. But... I guess they redirect money from all regions to the nation-wide projects, so the local problem never gets fixed.
The politicians are then moaning that the money from the road taxes is never enough......

God, forgive them, they don't know what they are doing

 

[4K8KW10]

Singapore

The asphalt layer in the Singapore streets isn't that smooth, easily seen in the race.

 

[4K8KW10]

They are not. You need to experience roads in other countries, there are places all over Europe alive with much worse roads than we have.

There are too many patches in the UK cities and towns, for instance, in Southampton.
But the countries with infrastructure problems are not that many in Europe and globally - maybe Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Romania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Serbia and Poland.
And that's it - the bad thing is that African countries have no worse infrastructure than the aforementioned countries.

 

[4K8KW10]

not a chance. you couldn't put trams in large parts of london or bristol, for example. there simply isn't the space for more than 2 cars quite often because the buildings are so close together. This is why London has an underground and there isn't one at all in Holland; they can get away with light rail because there's space.

B@

I think underground is Holland is technically very dificult since there you have negative sea levels, and the highest point is only 25 metres above sea level.

 

[4K8KW10]

I walked by someone fixing a lamp post or perhaps replacing a bulb. When I say someone I mean 2 men on cherry pickers, one guy at the bottom on the lorry, 3 men around with signs and barriers along . There were 6 people there in this tiny area.

I mean can you imagine how long it will take the UK to fix this sink hole?

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp....-vast-fukuoka-city-sinkhole-repaired-two-days

Definitely Japan

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...-vast-fukuoka-city-sinkhole-repaired-two-days

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/mar/24/japan-disaster-reconstruction-road-recovery

Japan, I mean come on, look at this..

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...-vast-fukuoka-city-sinkhole-repaired-two-days

2 days !!

This is the THIRD time someone posts the same news article. Guys, you must be very impressed by the Japanese.
They are the number one Technologically super advanced country - super power in the world.

 

[4K8KW10]

How can you ever hope to re-balance the economy when you aren't investing in the infrastructure in the areas where you want to re-balance????? Try commuting round up North and just take a close look at both public and private transport - quite shocking.

And rebalancing the economy won't work like you want. You think you would just have more money. But house prices would go up.

Investors always look for proper infrastructure. Investors build factories next to airports or large enough highways.
Investors don't build factories or real estate in the middle of nowhere, without the proper infrastructure built there first (there are exceptions in South-East Europe).

If everything works without breaking the laws, etc, the better infrastructure always brings a more developed economy, and the more developed economy brings more money.

 

[4K8KW10]

POTHOLE CRISIS: Shock number of UK roads in poor condition REVEALED https://www.express.co.uk/life-style/cars/933967/Pothole-crisis-shock-number-roads-poor-condition-UK