Struth! Give way to planes crossing

In his continuing search for the more weird, wacky and wondrous in the world of travel, David Ellis says Gibraltar is the only place in the world where the busiest highway within its territorial boundaries goes right across its only airport’s runway (or the runway cuts across the highway, depending on your point of view.)

With just 6.8 square kilometres of land to its name, and much of this taken up by its airport, Gibraltar’s main highway that connects it with neighbouring Spain has no room to skirt around the runway, so it simply dissects its.

And to ensure those aboard everything from motor-scooters to cars, trucks, semi-trailers and tourist coaches can’t stray onto the runway during take-offs or landings, traffic lights on the highway on either side of the runway are accompanied by loudspeakers emitting jet-engine noises to warn of approaching aircraft.

But with only around thirty flights a week (all to and from the UK,) traffic interruptions fortuitously are reasonably minimal.

FOOTNOTE: With Gibraltar, a British Overseas Territory, being so small, a bonus for tourists and business travellers is that from the airport into the centre of the city is all of 500 metres.

(Photo: Andrew Griffith/Wikimedia))