Roads are Turkey’s most important domestic transportation system, although only 130,000 kilometers of paved roads were in service in 2004, and little expansion has occurred since the 1950s. More than 250,000 kilometers of existing roads are unpaved. The state and provincial system includes about 65,000 kilometers of roads, of which 1,900 kilometers are classified as highways. Main highways radiate from Ankara in central Anatolia; Istanbul and Izmir in the west; Adana in the south; and Erzurum and Diyarbakır in the east.

The most important recent addition to the system is the Ankara-Istanbul toll road. Because the number of motor vehicles increased by more than 5 million, Turkey’s city streets are very congested, several major road and bridge projects were under discussion to link Anatolia more effectively with Europe.