Heavy-load crash tests to shut D1 near Prague on two weekends in August

The D1 motorway near Prague, in the Benešov area, will be completely closed for two overnight periods at the end of August 2026 — the Road and Motorway Directorate will carry out load tests on the repaired half of the Šmejkalka Bridge near Senohraby. This was announced by Directorate spokesman Luděk Hubáček.

The closures are scheduled from 8:00 p.m. on Friday, August 21, to 6:00 a.m. on Saturday, August 22, and then again from 8:00 p.m. on Saturday, August 22, to 8:00 a.m. on Sunday, August 23, 2026. Drivers heading from Prague towards Brno will be directed to exit at the 21st kilometre towards Benešov, while in the opposite direction, from Brno to Prague, cars and trucks up to 12 tonnes will be diverted at the Ostředek exit at the 34th kilometre. The detour route will run about 30 kilometres.

The detour route

According to Tereza Lipová, spokeswoman for the Benešov town hall, the detour for cars and trucks up to 12 tonnes will pass through Benešov. The route will be the same in both directions — via Kozmice and Soběhrdy, through Benešov, and then along road I/3 through Poříčí nad Sázavou, Čerčany and Pyšely towards Mirošovice. Transit trucks heavier than 12 tonnes will follow a separate detour, and the heaviest vehicles will have yet a third route.

A 256-tonne load test

Builders have completed the first half of the large-scale reconstruction of the Šmejkalka Bridge — the section leading towards Prague. Before opening it to traffic, engineers need to carry out control measurements under load. Eight fully loaded trucks will drive onto the bridge at the same time, putting a combined load of 256 tonnes on the new structure.

Special instruments will measure how many millimetres the bridge deflects, while sensors will record the stress in the concrete. "We're checking how the bridge responds to extreme loads, how the supports behave, whether there are any shifts, and whether sounds or vibrations are transmitted," Hubáček explained.

If all the measurements are successful, the new half of the bridge will open to traffic on Sunday, August 30. The night before, road crews will reset the markings and signs to shift traffic onto the repaired section — after which reconstruction of the remaining half will begin. The entire project is due to be completed by July 2027.

Restrictions until the repairs are finished

Until all the work is completed, drivers will have to use two narrowed lanes in each direction, with a speed limit of no more than 80 km/h. The total cost of the extensive repair reaches 965 million crowns. At the request of heritage preservation experts, builders had to keep the bridge's original concrete arch, while the rest of the structure has been gradually replaced with new elements since July 2024.

The Šmejkalka Bridge is part of a stretch of the D1 motorway that, according to a 2021 traffic census, carries around 44,000 vehicles a day. According to the Road and Motorway Directorate, this route, which links Prague, Brno and Ostrava, is the busiest on the entire Czech motorway network. Construction of the bridge began back in 1939, but it was only completed and opened as part of the motorway in 1977. The bridge is 247 metres long and more than 46 metres high.

Read also: Prague Metro: map and tickets

Source: novinky.cz