Meihan Expressway
The Meihan Expressway (名阪国道, Meihan Kokudō) is a national expressway in Mie Prefecture and Nara Prefecture, Japan. The expressway is also known as the Meihan National Highway. Together with the Nishi-Meihan Expressway and Higashi-Meihan Expressway, it is the central portion of a corridor linking the greater Nagoya and Osaka areas. It is owned and operated by Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism and is signed as an auxiliary route of National Route 25 as well as E25 under their "2016 Proposal for Realization of Expressway Numbering."[1]
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| Route information | |
| Maintained by Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism | |
| Length | 73.3 km (45.5 mi) |
| Existed | 1962–present |
| Component highways |  |
| Major junctions | |
| East end | Kaneyama Interchange.png){kind=small} in Kameyama, Mie |
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| West end | Tenri Interchange Tenri, Nara |
| Highway system | |
| National highways of Japan Expressways of Japan | |
Naming
Meihan is a kanji acronym of two characters. The first character represents Nagoya (名古屋) and the second character represents Osaka (大阪).
History
Construction on the Meihan Expressway began in March 1962, with an intended construction period of only one thousand days. The rapid construction of expressways in Japan at the time was spearheaded by Minister of Construction Ichirō Kōno in preparation for the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. It was opened as a two-lane expressway in December 1965.[2]
References
- "Japan's Expressway Numbering System". www.mlit.go.jp.
- Asai Kenji (2015-10-10). 日本の道路がわかる辞典 [A Dictionary of Japanese Roads] (in Japanese) (初版 ed.). 日本実業出版社. ISBN 978-4-534-05318-3.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
