Road and Motorway Facts and Figures

Roads and motorways are the backbone of our modern consumerist lifestyle.

Since paved highways were introduced to the UK by the Romans, they have become arguably the most integral part of our industrial system. They are incredibly important to pretty much every business in the country, including ours. Here are some facts and figures we have compiled about UK roads, and others from around the world.

Below is a comparison of the longest motorways in Britain. Since their introduction in December 1958, which saw the opening of the Preston By-pass, they have grown to an estimated length of 2,454 miles:

At the other end of the scale we find the A635(M), classified as the shortest motorway in the UK. The road, situated in inner-city Manchester, is a mere 300 metres in length. Heres how that compares to some other structures around the world:

Despite their massive length, UK motorways make up a surprisingly small amount of the total length of roads in the UK. In fact, they only account for 1% of the total length, whereas A-roads make up 12%, with the remaining 87% belonging to minor roads:

So how do we compare to the rest of the world? Well here are the top 5 countries in terms of the size of their road networks (measured in miles):

To find the United Kingdom, you have to go all the way down to number 17:

Don’t feel too much nationalistic shame, we are nowhere near the bottom:

Our ranking is actually quite astonishing when you consider we are just a little island in the north Atlantic. For example, here is how our longest road, the 396 mile long A1 between London and Edinburgh, compares to America’s longest road, the 3,365 mile long Route 20, between Boston, Massachusetts and Newport, Oregon.

That’s pretty eye opening, but it’s not as alarming as comparing the A1 to the world’s longest road, the Pan-America Highway. It runs from the tip of Canada to the bottom of Argentina, stretching 48,000,000 miles! To put that into perspective, if this image represented the total length of the A1:

The Pan-America highway would equate to 121,212 of these! Imagine the poor guy who had to paint the lines on that!