In 1932, Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967) had been Mayor of Cologne for 15 years. During this time he had realized many a large project, including the Cologne trade fair – today the headquarters of the television station RTL – a spectacular suspension bridge over the Rhine and a factory of the American car manufacturer Ford. But this, as the later first Chancellor suspected, was something special , something groundbreaking that pointed far beyond his hometown: “Germany’s oldest public autobahn”, as the federal autobahn GmbH describes the A555 from Cologne to Bonn. "This is what the roads of the future will look...