Without government intervention, a toll will have to be paid to travel the Soft Rope. After the back and forth that lasted months and the words of the minister and deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini, who had reassured the mayors during his last visit to Brescia on 29 February and who will be in Lumezzane today, there seems to be no more doubt: you will pay to use the infrastructure. At this point it’s just a matter of understanding when.
The knot
The motorway company appears to have already installed it twelve portals for photographing car license platestrace the owner, and send home, if they don’t have the Telepass, the slip with the amount.
Payment for the Montichiari – Ospitaletto connection is provided for by the agreements signed between the Ministry and Autovia Padana, which must recover 460 million euros spent on the expansion and redevelopment of the Corda Molle.
«The first convention was signed fifteen years ago – he explains Renato Pasinetti, mayor of Travagliato and member of the technical table of the Province set up to monitor this affair – expected the company to recover this money by paying the tolls at the Brescia Sud and Brescia Centro toll booths. In 2018, the then minister Delrio modified the agreement, establishing, without the knowledge of the mayors, that that money Autovia Padana recovered them by putting a toll on the Soft Cord».
The summit in Broletto
Next week Broletto has convened the top management of the infrastructure management company to identify possible solutionsbut at this point, for the local administrators of the Bassa, only government intervention could avoid the worst.
The agreements allow the company to subject the infrastructure to toll and the fee would also already be set: 10 cents per kilometer for cars and between 20 and 25 for heavy vehicles. If this were the case, however, according to the mayors – Fabrizio Scuri from Cazzago and Filippo Spagnoli from Montirone are also part of the technical table – the strategic role of the Corda Molle, created to relieve traffic congestion in towns which, inevitably, would return if the connection were to be paid for. For the mayors, therefore, we should return to the agreement before 2018 and increase the toll on the A21.
The minister spoke on the topic yesterday Giancarlo Giorgettiarrived in Brescia to support Federico Casali’s candidacy for mayor of Ghedi.
«I don’t know how this story will end – said the Northern League member, without giving false hope -. It is clear that normally no one is in favor of paying contributions or forms of toll, but the infrastructure must be financed in some way. Here we need to decide who, fairly, should take charge of this.”
