Rodovia Belém-Brasília is a federal highway

Highway

A highway is any public road. In American English, the term is common and almost always designates major roads. In British English, the term designates any road open to the public. Any interconnected set of highways can be variously referred to as a "highway system", a "highway network", or a...

 in Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

. It is named after its chief engineer

Engineer

An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...

, who died in an accident during the construction of the highway, when a tree fell over his tent. It is one of the longest highways in South America

South America

South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...

, running in an almost perfect North-South direction from the city of Belém

Belém

Belém is a Brazilian city, the capital and largest city of state of Pará, in the country's north region. It is the entrance gate to the Amazon with a busy port, airport and bus/coach station...

, in the state of Pará

Pará

Pará is a state in the north of Brazil. It borders the Brazilian states of Amapá, Maranhão, Tocantins, Mato Grosso, Amazonas and Roraima. To the northwest it also borders Guyana and Suriname, and to the northeast it borders the Atlantic Ocean. The capital is Belém.Pará is the most populous state...

 and the Federal capital city of Brasília

Brasília

Brasília is the capital city of Brazil. The name is commonly spelled Brasilia in English. The city and its District are located in the Central-West region of the country, along a plateau known as Planalto Central. It has a population of about 2,557,000 as of the 2008 IBGE estimate, making it the...

.

The total length of the highway is 1,950 km, passing through the Federal District and four states:

• Federal District
  Brazilian Federal District
  The Federal District is set apart for Brasília, the capital of Brazil. Located in a region called Planalto Central, or Central Plateau, the Federal District is divided in 29 administrative regions. Brasilia - place where the three branches of the Federal Government are located - is the main...
  
  : 44.6 km
• State of Goiás
  Goiás
  Goiás is a state of Brazil, located in the central part of the country. The name Goiás comes from the name of an indigenous community...
  
  : 287.9 km
• State of Tocantins
  Tocantins (state)
  Tocantins is one of the states of Brazil. . The state was formed in 1988 out of the northern part of Goiás, and construction began on the capital, Palmas, in 1989, in contrast to most of the other cities in the state which date back to the Portuguese colonial period...
  
  : 773.2 km
• State of Maranhão
  Maranhão
  Maranhão is a northeastern state of Brazil. To the north lies the Atlantic Ocean. Maranhão is neighbored by the states of Piauí, Tocantins and Pará. The people of Maranhão have a distinctive accent...
  
  : 379.1 km
• State of Pará
  Pará
  Pará is a state in the north of Brazil. It borders the Brazilian states of Amapá, Maranhão, Tocantins, Mato Grosso, Amazonas and Roraima. To the northwest it also borders Guyana and Suriname, and to the northeast it borders the Atlantic Ocean. The capital is Belém.Pará is the most populous state...
  
  : 465,3 km

It interconnects with the Rodovia Transbrasiliana

Rodovia Transbrasiliana

Rodovia Transbrasiliana is a federal highway in Brazil .It crosses Brazil in the North-South direction, starting in Marabá, state of Pará and ending in Aceguá, in the state of Rio Grande do Sul...

 at the level of the Federal District, thus forming a continuous North-South highway until reaching the state of Rio Grande do Sul.

History

This was the first road built in the 1960s through the unforgiving Amazon rainforest

Amazon Rainforest

The Amazon Rainforest , also known in English as Amazonia or the Amazon Jungle, is a moist broadleaf forest that covers most of the Amazon Basin of South America...

. Its construction was one of the highest achievements of road engineering, due to the enormous difficulties faced by designing it and by the construction crews (more than 5,000 courses of water had to be conquered, and new ways of bulldozing and felling massive tree

Tree

A tree is a perennial woody plant. It is most often defined as a woody plant that has many secondary branches supported clear of the ground on a single main stem or trunk with clear apical dominance. A minimum height specification at maturity is cited by some authors, varying from 3 m to...

s higher than 50 m and with girths exceeding 4 to 5 m in diameter had to be devised. Initially it was a dirt road, but in the succeeding years it was macadamized and more permanent bridge

Bridge

A bridge is a structure built to span physical obstacles such as a body of water, valley, or road, for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle...

s were built.

The Belém-Brasília highway was fundamental to bring modernity to a completely wild region. Many agricultural

Agriculture

Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...

 settlements and entire new cities, with its suite of commerce

Commerce

While business refers to the value-creating activities of an organization for profit, commerce means the whole system of an economy that constitutes an environment for business. The system includes legal, economic, political, social, cultural, and technological systems that are in operation in any...

, industry

Industry

Industry refers to the production of an economic good or service within an economy.-Industrial sectors:There are four key industrial economic sectors: the primary sector, largely raw material extraction industries such as mining and farming; the secondary sector, involving refining, construction,...

, etc, sprang along the highway. It was also the first land connection between Belém, one of the two capítals of the Amazon region (the other being Manaus

Manaus

Manaus is a city in Brazil, the capital of the state of Amazonas. It is situated at the confluence of the Negro and Solimões rivers. It is the most populous city of Amazonas, according to the statistics of Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics, and is a popular ecotourist destination....

) and the rest of the country, so that the economic potential and development of the region could be increased. In its beginning, a trip through the road was a dangerous undertaking, due to the presence of wild animals such as the ferocious spotted jaguar

Jaguar

The jaguar is a big cat, a feline in the Panthera genus, and is the only Panthera species found in the Americas. The jaguar is the third-largest feline after the tiger and the lion, and the largest in the Western Hemisphere. The jaguar's present range extends from Southern United States and Mexico...

s and poisonous snake

Snake

Snakes are elongate, legless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes that can be distinguished from legless lizards by their lack of eyelids and external ears. Like all squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales...

s, and also of road banditry. There were no hotel

Hotel

A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. The provision of basic accommodation, in times past, consisting only of a room with a bed, a cupboard, a small table and a washstand has largely been replaced by rooms with modern facilities, including en-suite bathrooms...

s, gasoline stations and restaurant

Restaurant

A restaurant is an establishment which prepares and serves food and drink to customers in return for money. Meals are generally served and eaten on premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services...

s along the highway and travellers had to carry their own supplies. Today, it entails a drive of approximately 2 days.

External links

• BR-010. Ministry of Transportation