The Atlantic Ocean Road or the Atlantic Road (Norwegian: Atlanterhavsveien) is a 8.3-kilometer (5.2 mi) long section of County Road 64 which runs through an archipelago in Eide and Averøy in Møre og Romsdal, Norway. The fixed link passes by Hustadvika, an unsheltered part of the Norwegian Sea, connecting the island of Averøy with the mainland and Romsdalshalvøya peninsula. The road runs between the villages of Kårvåg on Averøy and Vevang in Eida. The road is built on several small islands and skerries, which are connected by several causeways, viaducts and eight bridges—the most prominent being Storseisundet Bridge.
The route was originally proposed as a railway line in the early 20th century, but this was ultimately abandoned. Serious planning of the road started in the 1970s, and construction started on 1 August 1983. During construction, the area was hit by twelve hurricanes. The road was opened on 7 July 1989, having cost 122 million Norwegian krone (NOK), of which 25 percent was financed with tolls and the rest from public grants. Collection of tolls was scheduled to run for 15 years, but by June 1999 the road was paid off and the toll removed. The road is preserved as a cultural heritage site and is classified as a National Tourist Route. It is a popular site to film automotive commercials, has been declared the world's best road trip, and been awarded the title as "Norwegian Construction of the Century". In 2009, the Atlantic Ocean Tunnel opened from Averøy to Kristiansund; combined, they have become a second fixed link between Kristiansund and Molde.
Read more about Atlantic Ocean Road: Route Description, History, Junctions
Famous quotes containing the words atlantic ocean, atlantic, ocean and/or road:
“All the morning we had heard the sea roar on the eastern shore, which was several miles distant.... It was a very inspiriting sound to walk by, filling the whole air, that of the sea dashing against the land, heard several miles inland. Instead of having a dog to growl before your door, to have an Atlantic Ocean to growl for a whole Cape!”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“They commonly celebrate those beaches only which have a hotel on them, not those which have a humane house alone. But I wished to see that seashore where man’s works are wrecks; to put up at the true Atlantic House, where the ocean is land-lord as well as sea-lord, and comes ashore without a wharf for the landing; where the crumbling land is the only invalid, or at best is but dry land, and that is all you can say of it.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“If fishes were wishes the ocean would be all of our desire.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)
“Much as I own I owe
The passers of the past
Because their to and fro
Has cut this road to last,
I owe them more today
Because they’ve gone away....”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)