The decision against the construction of new Alpine motorways was unanimous. (c) Jean-Loup Bertez
In recent years there have been several attempts by regions to reintroduce the Alemagna motorway from Venice to Munich onto the European agenda. At the suggestion of CIPRA, on 13 and 14 June the Permanent Committee of the Alpine Convention unanimously expressed its opposition to this new Alpine motorway.
The Transport Protocol of the Alpine Convention is very clear: Article 11 states that “the contracting parties shall refrain from building any new, large-capacity roads for transalpine traffic.” However, voices from the Veneto region are repeatedly calling for a new motorway to run between Munich and Venice, even though every country concerned (Germany, Austria and Italy) as well as the European Union have ratified the Transport Protocol of the Alpine Convention. It is particularly disturbing that the committees of the EU’s macro-regional strategy for the Alpine Region (EUSALP), which like the countries affected are also bound by the Alpine Convention and its protocols, are being used for these efforts.
At the initiative of CIPRA, the International Commission for the Protection of the Alps, the Permanent Committee of the Alpine Convention unanimously decided at its meeting on 13 and 14 June 2018 to clearly position itself against this new motorway over the Alps. The wording of the decision is as follows: “With regard to recent discussions about new, large-capacity road projects, the parties to the Alpine Convention reaffirm their full commitment to the Convention and its protocols, in particular the Transport Protocol and the obligations set out in its articles regarding environmentally-friendly traffic management, and especially to those of Article 11.”
Katharina Conradin, President of CIPRA International, expressed her satisfaction about this clear commitment: “The Alps suffer enough as it is from transalpine traffic, noise, air pollution and, finally, climate change. This clear commitment by the parties to oppose the expansion of the transalpine road network is thus all the more gratifying.”
