Where debating everything under the sun is only the beginning

In Belgium they call it an autostrade.

http://www.asfinag.at/newsroom/wssarchiv/-/asset_publisher/3037242/content/autobahn-versus-autostra%C3%9Fe-%E2%80%93-der-feine-unterschied
Mit der Änderung von 2006 des Bundesstraßengesetzes 1971 wurden sämtliche Unterscheidungen von Schnellstraßen und Autobahnen aufgehoben.

That's from Austria. 

That's an usual term for some Romanic languages such as Italian or Romanian - autostrada (auto+strada).

While the Nicaraguan canal promises to vastly expand the Central American shipping corridor, a further two mega-canals are being negotiated. They would offer alternatives to two other major sea routes, namely the Bosporus – Russia’s sole southerly maritime access to the outside world – and the narrow Straits of Malacca, the gateway to China. Their advocates have watched the Nicaragua protests with interest, and their mood may well have been lifted by developments there.

Bypassing the Straits of Malacca would mean cutting a 50-kilometre notch through a finger of land called the Kra isthmus, in the south of Thailand (see map). This would give China, the region’s superpower, the option for its ships to avoid the congested straits, shortening a route used at present by a third of all international cargo shipping. Container ships sailing between Shanghai and Mumbai, for example, would be able to shave more than two days off an 11-day journey.

The environmental impact of the project has not been studied but could be considerable, says Ruth Banomyong of the Thammasat University in Bangkok. However, as in Nicaragua, political will is unlikely to bow to environmental concerns. With an estimated cost of $20 billion, the Thai canal will be the cheapest of the proposed mega-canals, as well as the simplest to build. Another plus is that it would fulfil a promise made in 2013 by Chinese premier Xi Jinping to create a “maritime silk road”.

Both the Thai and Nicaraguan canals are dwarfed by a project being plotted to connect the Caspian Sea with the Persian Gulf. Its route would cleave right across Iran, stretching some 1400 kilometres. But length is hardly the biggest challenge. It would also need to traverse mountains up to 1600 metres high, requiring more than 50 giant locks, says Peyman Moazzen, a marine engineer based in Singapore, who has studied the scheme.

But the geopolitical prize might be worth the effort. Such a link would give Russia a long-desired sea route to east Asia that avoids the circuitous journey via essentially Western-controlled seaways like the Bosporus and the Suez Canal. Any environmental concerns would probably be trumped by the fact that Iranians think one of the proposed routes could double as an irrigation canal, watering the desert sands of eastern Iran.

Both the Thai and Nicaraguan canals are dwarfed by a project being plotted to connect the Caspian Sea with the Persian Gulf. Its route would cleave right across Iran, stretching some 1400 kilometres. But length is hardly the biggest challenge. It would also need to traverse mountains up to 1600 metres high, requiring more than 50 giant locks, says Peyman Moazzen, a marine engineer based in Singapore, who has studied the scheme.

So: The world was destroyed! (I didn't notice... Perhaps from Portugal it looks different?    )

Belfrager, have you anything -beyond your garden- that interests you?

Then I hope your garden is a continual joy.

They are worth a look btw. Here's Stockholm. Can you say "Single point of failure"? I knew you could (that will improve in a couple years from now).

These are three  tunnels (plus tunnels for railroad).