The A17 road is a mostly single carriageway road linking Newark-on-Trent in Nottinghamshire, England, to King's Lynn in Norfolk. It stretches for a distance of 62 miles travelling across the flat fen landscapes of southern Lincolnshire and western Norfolk and links the East Midlands with East Anglia. The road is notable for its numerous roundabouts and notoriously dangerous staggered junctions and also for its most famous landmark, the Cross Keys Bridge at Sutton Bridge close to the Lincolnshire/Cambridgeshire/Norfolk borders which carries the road over the River Nene.

Newark-on-Trent or Newark is a market town and civil parish in the Newark and Sherwood district in Nottinghamshire, England. It is on the River Trent, and was historically a major inland port. The A1 road bypasses the town on the line of the ancient Great North Road. The town's origins are likely to be Roman, as it lies on a major Roman road, the Fosse Way. It grew up round Newark Castle, St Mary Magdalene church and later developed as a centre for the wool and cloth trades.