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There has never been so much traffic jams on the Gotthard as this summer. Now there is resistance.
There have never been so many traffic jams at the Gotthard: In July of this year, the Uri canton police recorded around 350 hours of traffic jams on the Gotthard motorway, as reported by the Tages-Anzeiger. That is a new record. For comparison: Before the pandemic in July 2019, the police registered 265 hours of traffic jams. And nationally, too, the hours of traffic jams on national roads are already on the rise again: in 2021 they rose by 44 percent compared to 2020 and were only 7 percent below the value of 2019. And that despite the fact that contact restrictions still applied in some cases in 2021 due to the pandemic.
This is how the congestion regime at the Gotthard works: Because the Gotthard tunnel only has one lane in each direction, vehicles regularly queue up for many kilometers in front of the two portals. To prevent drivers from simply avoiding the traffic jam on the cantonal road and turning back onto the motorway just before the tunnel in Göschenen, the Uri cantonal police close the entrance to Göschenen from a traffic jam of 3 kilometers in length. The Erstfeld and Amsteg exits are also “metered”, so only enough vehicles are allowed from the motorway onto the cantonal road so that there are no traffic jams on it.
As an attempt, the entrance to Wassen was also closed to the south in the last two weeks due to traffic jams. Anyone who had already left the autobahn earlier had to make their way over the Gotthard Pass and could no longer get back on the autobahn in Wassen. This attempt was now aborted prematurely due to a construction site, the evaluation is still pending.
This is what the alternative traffic means for the residents of the Urner Reusstal: The alternative traffic causes additional noise and stench in the villages of Erstfeld, Amsteg and Wassen. In addition, the inhabitants of the villages can only reach their apartments and houses with difficulty because of the constant traffic jams. That is why there is now resistance among the population: in Wassen two weeks ago, around 25 people repeatedly crossed the street on the pedestrian crossings in order to slow down the traffic. And now an interest group wants to collect signatures for a petition. This is intended to put pressure on the authorities to do something about the traffic.
This is what politics demands: The Uri Central Councilor Heidi Zgraggen has in the Council of States a push submitted. She wants to know from the competent Astra office how it intends to change the “unsustainable conditions” for the population in the Urner Reusstal. And it brings measures such as the temporary closure of the canton road, a driving ban for certain types of vehicles or, for example, the release of the emergency lane for residents, into play.
This is what the expert says: It is not possible to give preference to a specific group on cantonal roads. That says traffic expert Ruedi Häfliger from the traffic planning office Metron. “According to federal law, public roads are generally accessible to everyone, you can only make traffic rules that apply to everyone. Exceptions are only possible for neighborhood streets, for example for residential protection. » However, truck driving bans or speed reductions would be possible, for example. According to Häfliger, a change in the law is needed to exclude certain population groups from traffic.