By the time construction was completed, the highway was considered by many aspects such as the most important engineering complex done in America after the Panama Canal, through a range of unmatched engineering prowess to that time, a spectacular highway which runs through the picturesque mountains of the north. The construction of the highway began in January 1950 after six years of careful study by the Ministry of Public Works in Venezuela during the military regime by colonel Marcos Pérez Jiménez (1952-1958).