Italy: Protests against driving bans in Tyrol
Every year, sectoral and night-time transit bans take effect in Tyrol to keep the high volume of traffic under control - to the benefit of citizens and the environment. Every year Austria is criticised by neighbouring countries for exactly this reason. A "Brenner Coordination Group" will now organise large protest actions.
370 million euros lost per year for every hour of delay in crossing the border - this is the damage caused by the Tyrolean driving bans on Italian commercial traffic alone. This is according to a press release issued by FAI-Conftrasporto at a meeting in Verona last week where freight associations, politicians and companies came together for a plan against the driving bans. Increasingly, they are expected to demonstrate against the driving restrictions for trucks in the coming months. The meeting was even attended by Italian MEP Paolo Borchia from the EU Transport Commission and the Vice-President of the Transport Committee of the Italian Chamber of Deputies - as well as German associations, which will also be involved in upcoming protest actions.
"We will mobilise all forces so that Europe intervenes decisively in Austria," the press spokesman told the conference. He added that the situation on the Brenner motorway had long since become unmanageable and that, from all appearances, Austria had no intention of retracting its steps. According to the authorities from Tyrol, the driving bans are to remain in place - despite the large number of calls for exactly the opposite. "The nightly truck stop from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. slows down the arrival of goods and harms trade and Italian products," namely explains Alessio Sorio, head of the FAI association in Verona. Although companies could move their goods by rail, the Brenner railway lines are still far from being able to transport goods en masse.
The railway line needs to be upgraded. And that is what transport and trade authorities on both sides of the Alps think. But as long as such an expansion and improvement of the lines does not take place, there would in fact be no sensible alternative to the thousands of lorries that cross the Brenner Pass every day. To act against this by means of driving bans would be an offence against truck drivers and the industry they represent, for example in Italy or Germany. An offence that the Italian Transport Minister Matteo Salvini also wants to take legal action against. He is primarily asking the European Transport Commission to initiate infringement proceedings against Austria.
An attempt that will probably not be crowned with success. Especially since the reasons for Austria to impose truck driving bans still remain. At least that is the opinion of Fritz Gurgiser, chairman of the Transitforum Austria-Tirol. Not a single one "of the regulations that are now being publicly attacked again has ever endangered the transport of goods over the Brenner". It is not for nothing that in 2018, 2019 and 2021 more than 2.5 million transit trucks rolled over the Brenner on an unprecedented scale - Gurgiser continues. And this despite the fact that there is already a driving ban in the Tyrolean environmental zone on the Inntal motorway for all trucks with Euro 0-5 and without an environmental sticker. However, no one disputes the need to find a compromise for the traffic arteries in Tyrol that both the region's living and economic space could reconcile.
Until then, it is to be expected that the situation on the Brenner will remain tense - and full of driving bans for truck drivers. You can find out which other traffic restrictions are currently active on our website or in the Green-Zones app.