Brazilian Highway System - Motorways

Motorways

Due to the country's growth and the associated traffic increase, the Government has started the construction and adaptation of main road sections into motorways. The first one to be completed was the so called Via Dutra (BR-116), the important highway connecting São Paulo to Rio de Janeiro, which was finished on the 1975 with a 2X2 setting, but retained some grade crossings. Later, other roads were built or expanded to dual carriageways, like the Via Fernão Dias, connecting Belo Horizonte to São Paulo; the Via Bandeirantes, connecting São Paulo to the State's countryside; the Via Litoral Sul, connecting Curitiba to Florianópolis, and a few others.

Nowadays, the Government and the private section are planning to duplicate thousands of kilometers, with few hundreds already on their way. For example, the first section of the Northeastern Corridor, connecting the capital city of Natal to Palmares, southern of Pernambuco State, the road connecting Goiânia to Uberlândia, this one on the west of Minas Gerais state, the road connecting Palhoça, on Florianópolis Metropolitan Area, to Osório, a city 90 km west from Porto Alegre, already connected by a dual, modern, six lane carriageway road, and few others.

The projects are the link between Brasília and Belo Horizonte (800 km), Belo Horizonte and Juiz de Fora (close to the Minas Gerais-Rio de Janeiro State Border), with 200 km, the Rio-Bahia Road System, between Três Rios (app. 150 km from Rio de Janeiro City, already connected to the State Capital by a dual carriageway road) and Feira de Santana (app. 200 km from Salvador, also connected by a dual carriageway road), and the important connection between Palmares and Salvador.

It is important to say that the majority of these roads are or are going to be tolled roads maintained by the private concessionaires (like the link between Florianópolis and Belo Horizonte, or the link between Rio de Janeiro and Salvador, or even the link between Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo), however, some roads, like the link between Salvador and Natal, which will be more than a 1,000 km long of a full dual carriageway system, will not, by the next few years, be tolled, and will link, more likely by 2014, 70% of all the economy and the population of the Northeast Region.