Réunion possesses a network of

highway A highway is any public or private road or other public way on land. It is used for major roads, but also includes other public roads and public tracks. In some areas of the United States, it is used as an equivalent term to controlled-acces ...

s, which cover a total distance of 2,784 km. Of that length, 2,187 km of the road system is paved. There are no roads going into the cirque of

Mafate The ''Cirque de Mafate'' is a caldera on Réunion Island (France; located in the Indian Ocean). It was formed from the collapse of the large shield volcano the ''Piton des Neiges''. The very remote and inaccessible cirque was settled in the 19 ...

; thus transportation there has to take place by foot or

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

Motorways

A system of

highways A highway is any public or private road or other public way on land. It is used for major roads, but also includes other public roads and public tracks. In some areas of the United States, it is used as an equivalent term to controlled-access ...

that run between the main cities has been developed. * Route national 1 (N1/RN1) connects Saint-Denis to Saint-Pierre, also connecting Le Port, Saint-Paul, La Saline Les Hauts and Saint-Louis. It has a length of 76 km. *N2 connects Saint-Denis to Saint-Benoît, also connecting Saint-André. Its length is 34 km. *N3 connects Saint-Pierre to Saint-Benoît, but the motorway only goes from Saint-Pierre to

Le Tampon Le Tampon () is the fourth-largest commune in the French overseas department of Réunion. It is located on the south-central part of the island of Réunion, adjacent to Saint-Pierre. In the early twentieth century, the town was the base for th ...

, with a length of 7 km.

Sea

There are two major ports in Réunion: Le Port and Pointe des Galets. There are six marinas. Réunion possesses a merchant marine of one ship with a weight exceeding 1,000 gt, which is a chemical tanker.

Airports

There are two

airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial air transport. Airports usually consists of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surfa ...

s on the island, of which both have paved runways. The main airport is the international

Roland Garros Airport Roland Garros Airport (french: Aéroport de la Réunion Roland Garros) , formerly known as Gillot Airport, is located in Sainte-Marie on Réunion, France. The airport is east of Saint-Denis; it is named after the French aviator Roland Garros ...

located close to Saint-Denis and the second one is the Aéroport de Pierrefond, located near Saint-Pierre in the south of the island.

Railways

There are no railways in Réunion, with the exception of a short tourist line, which was originally part of a larger rail network. A 42 km light rail project was cancelled in 2010, after a regional government change in 2010, mostly because the project was considered too expensive (€1.6 billion). The region's new president chose to fund a new coastal road instead. In 2019 a new light rail system was proposed to link Le Barachois with the airport.

Cable car

Due to huge traffic congestion, channelled by the rough topography on the main coastal road, public authorities invested in a cable car transportation system, linking two districts of Saint-Denis : Le Chaudron to Bois de Nèfles, with three intermediate stops. Built by POMA, a leading French company in cable car systems, it opened in March 2022. With 46 cabins, it is designed to transport up to 1200 persons per hour. This cable car is the first in the whole Indian Ocean.

References

Notes

External links

Aéroport Roland Garros
(Main airport)

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