From the SS 89 subjected to a series of structural interventions
THE WAITING has continued for over a quarter of a century, a long painful pause that has finally come to an end: the works for the adaptation of the State Road 89, in the stretch between the junction for Manfredonia and the Amendola airport, are in the Anas work agenda. A stretch of 14,400 kilometers on which numerous accidents have been recorded, including fatal ones, which will finally be equipped with the necessary preventive safety measures in continuation of those already installed on the rest of the route up to Foggia.
A fundamental ARTERY in the road network that climbs from the plain onto the Gargano promontory, hence called “Garganica”, very busy especially in spring and summer when the circulation of vehicles increases exceptionally. A crowding to the limit of bearability of roads that have remained the primordial ones which have only been modernized in a few short stretches. The intervention that Anas is now preparing to carry out will fill a deficit that has been reported for a very long time, underlined by a series of road accidents.
The OBJECTIVE of the project is in fact to improve travel and safety conditions through the widening of the current single-lane road, transforming it into two lanes in each direction separated by a traffic island; the creation of new junctions and the organization of local roads. One of the critical points is the one at the Abbey of San Leonardo, a sanctuary frequented not only by the faithful forced to cross the road with which dangers need not be imagined having materialized repeatedly.
AN extremely dangerous POINT which will be eliminated with the creation of a junction and a coplanar road which will allow direct access to the abbey from the opposite lane in safe conditions. Among the innovative works are also those of three junctions and two semi-junctions, and the viaduct over the Candelaro stream.
AN organic INTERVENTION which required an in-depth study of the territory frequented since the prehistoric-protohistoric age and, through the Roman and late ancient ages, up to the medieval age and naturally in the modern era. A complex study conducted with in-depth historical, bibliographic and aerial photogrammetric research, with particular attention to archaeological aspects. A painstaking work summarized in tables, documents and cards. A work that went far beyond the construction of new parts of a road route that crosses that territory. The field reconnaissance – the designers note – even made it possible to intercept both traces of settlements already known in the bibliography, and new areas of archaeological interest that deserve the attention of archaeological scholars and researchers. A practical example is that of the “old bridge” over the Candelaro, the stream that flows from inside the Capitanata onto the Siponto coast, whose dating lacks objective evidence that would determine its construction.
Michael Apollonius
