Also known as Gravelly Hill Interchange, the Spaghetti Junction is one of the most important connections between North, South, East and West in the country. It’s also a fundamental motorway link to transport and logistics in Europe.
Located at M6 Motorway meeting A38(M) Aston Express in Birmingham, this interchange was opened in May of 1972, providing access to at least 18 routes in the city.
It was a complex construction that took almost four years to be completed and the junction was designed to last 120 years. But obviously, several repairs have been done in years since the interchange has been opened.
Carrying 120.000 vehicles a day, the Spaghetti Junction transports approximately 5 million tons of freight vehicles every week. It’s an impressive number that put the Gravelly Hill Interchange in the Guinness Book of World Records as the “most complex interchange on the British Road System”.
“Underneath the motorway junction are the meeting points of local roads, the river Thame’s confluences with the River Rea and Hockley Brook, electricity lines, gas pipelines, the Cross-city and Walsall railway lines and Salford junctions, where the Grand Union Canal, Birmingham and Fazeley Canal and Tame Valley Canal meet”.
There it is, how Spaghetti Junction is underneath:
Photos: Rob Dann
Great pics!
Thanks Mel! There are more to be posted soon!