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The logistics of the North West have an extra weapon: the completion of the A33 Asti-Cuneo motorway. A highly anticipated work for goods traveling between Ligurian ports, the heart of Piedmont and international markets. After 34 years, a final cost of 1.457 billion euros compared to the 340 million estimated at the beginning, the eternal unfinished project finally comes to fruition.
From today, Tuesday 30 December, the A33 motorway is entirely accessible to traffic from Asti to Cuneo (90 kilometres). An exception is a five kilometer stretch where you will travel on a single two-way carriageway, in complete safety, while the complete closure of the construction site and the opening of the second carriageway are scheduled for April 2026. The work on the last lot, from Alba to Cherasco, was completed in just 15 months instead of 30, thanks to the employment of around 400 people per day on the construction site, 15 companies and 130 suppliers. The infrastructure fills a historical gap in the connections of southern Piedmont, improving the accessibility of an area with a strong agricultural and manufacturing vocation.
A historical turning point
The announcement of the completion of the motorway came on 30 December, when the Deputy Minister of Infrastructure, Edoardo Rixi and the President of the Piedmont Region, Alberto Cirio, traveled the entire route from Asti to the junction with the A6 Turin-Savona (Autostrada dei Fiori) in Marene. Rixi says: “It’s a historic turning point: a thirty-year-long wound is closing.” Cirio underlines: «We are in the economic and productive heart not only of Piedmont, but also of the national and European GDP. A few kilometers from here there is Ferrero, but also many important companies that work for Ferrero and from today they will have the opportunity to compete with their international competitors without the transport penalty.” The concessionaire of the A33 is Asti-Cuneo Spa, a company of the Astm group (Gavio), the second national motorway operator after Aspi (Autostrade per l’Italia).
One of the longest infrastructure projects in the country
The event marks the conclusion of one of the longest infrastructure events in the country, often cited as a negative example of unfinished work due to the succession of blocks, design revisions and financial difficulties that have arisen over the years. The Asti-Cuneo motorway project was formally born on 5 April 1991 with the signing of the first concession. The original project envisaged a completion date of 1996. The implementation phase, however, immediately proved to be complex. In 1998 the work was included among those financed by law 295 and in 2000 Anas started the first construction sites. In 2006, the Asti-Cuneo motorway project company was established, controlled by the Gavio group, which took over the management of the sections already built and the completion of the work. The first openings to traffic arrived between 2005 and 2008. From 2012 to 2020 the work entered its most critical phase: for around eight years the construction sites remained essentially at a standstill due to disputes, bureaucratic delays, high costs due to design choices and the lack of financial coverage. The famous photograph of the unfinished section near Cherasco, which ended suspended in thin air in an agricultural area, became the symbol of this long paralysis.
Cross-financing approved by the European Union
The work underwent a crucial turning point thanks to the approval of cross-financing by the European Union. This instrument provides for the support of adjacent and economically strong concessionaire companies, capable of making large-scale investments to support the motorway to be completed. In particular, this mechanism made it possible to guarantee the construction of the two missing lots, for a total of approximately 10 kilometres, of the Asti-Cuneo area thanks to the cross-financing by Satap, the concessionaire of the A4 Turin-Milan motorway, to cover the costs of carrying out the work.
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