The A2 motorway and the N2 ring road on the west side of Eindhoven will turn red for a month from Thursday. Due to the installation of a huge tunnel, most lanes will be closed until August 22 and the maximum speed will be reduced to 70 kilometers per hour. This means that traffic between the Batadorp and Leenderheide interchanges must take into account up to an hour of extra travel time.
This also applies to travelers who want to go to Eindhoven Airport via the N2. Traffic is being diverted from all directions. Maurice de Graef of Rijkswaterstaat about this: “The normal routes to Eindhoven Airport are not accessible, so turn off your navigation and follow the detour signs with Eindhoven Airport as soon as you approach the Eindhoven ring road.”
Rijkswaterstaat acknowledges that the situation will be very uncomfortable for anyone who regularly uses that route. “But even if you’ve never been here, you’ll have to deal with barriers, diversion signs and closures within which you have to find your way.”
“Everything is immediately established when something happens.”
Dozens of road inspectors from Rijkswaterstaat will exchange their cars for a motorcycle around Eindhoven in the coming month. This is necessary to be able to stop traffic in the event of an accident or other calamity, so that emergency services can reach the scene of the accident.
Maurice de Graef: “With fewer lanes that are also narrower, we no longer have room for emergency lanes. That means that everything is immediately established if something happens.” The deployment of motor road inspectors and special access lanes for emergency services should solve this.
“We’re still at it for a year.”
The tunnel or underpass will soon connect the Goods Distribution Center (GDC) on the north side of Eindhoven with Eindhoven Airport, the Flight Forum and Brainport Industries Campus on the west side of the city. The underpass also provides GDC freight traffic with a direct connection to the A58.
The work is the final piece of the new road structure in the northern part of Eindhoven. This has been worked on for years. Hendrik Jan Vennix of the municipality of Eindhoven emphasizes that the work has not yet been completed with the placement of the underpass. “We still have to finish the tunnel and then access ramps are also needed, so we have another year to go.”
According to the current planning, the tunnel barge will be put into use in the summer of next year.