A7 motorway (Netherlands)

The A7 motorway is a motorway in the Netherlands connecting Zaandam, via the Afsluitdijk, Sneek and Groningen to the German border near Bad Nieuweschans. The entire road is part of the European route E22, with exception of the first kilometre, between the terminus in Zaandam and the interchange Zaandam. With a length of 236 km it is the longest motorway in the Netherlands.

Motorway interruptions

The motorway A7 is interrupted twice:

• Around Sneek, the road is 'demoted' to a highway for several kilometres, and included some at-grade intersections, the at-grade intersections were replaced with grade separated intersections in 2008-2010, however, it isn't a motorway.
• Also around the city of Groningen it is demoted over a distance of several kilometres, mainly for the at-grade intersection with motorway A28, and for the road's small alignment through the city in general.

Both of the abovementioned sections are denoted as 'N7', to distinguish those parts from the motorway, for which the 'A' designation is used in the Netherlands. The A7 together with the N7 is called the Rijksweg 7.

Speed limit experiment

As of March 2011, on a section of the A7 motorway motorists are allowed to drive at 130 km/h, instead of the normal country wide maximum of 120 km/h. This is a government test to investigate if driving at these higher speeds has an effect on environment and safety. If the test results positively, more motorways in the Netherlands will have a higher speed limit.

Afsluitdijk

The A7 runs along a historic part of Dutch engineering, the Afsluitdijk. This dam was originally created to protect a large coastal line from floods, by creating a large fresh water lake. The road over the Afsluitdijk was previously an N road, but is now a proper motorway.

Exit list