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Yeah, the Italian highways were a high engineering project. Even the asphalt quality that still used today has the ability to absorb water pretty quickly and do

Yeah, the Italian highways were a high engineering project. Even the asphalt quality that still used today has the ability to absorb water pretty quickly and don’t leave dangerous patches of water on the road with heavy rains. The problem is that all the highway projects, despite being government financed, are now mostly in the hand of large private companies and rich families (Benetton) which made the price usage skyrocket. Traveling by car in Italy is now expensive for residents, and the alternative roads are slow and dangerous. In Switzerland the annual highway subscription is ~€40

tomalbrc 2y ago
Expensive as it should be
- manuelmoreale 2y ago
  Care to explain why? Vast majority of highways in Italy are owned by the state. And we already pay taxes.
  - epolanski 2y ago
    They are owned by the state, but they are not managed by the state but Autostrade per L'Italia SPA.
    - manuelmoreale 2y ago
      Yes. And Holding Reti Autostradali S.p.A. owns the 88% of that SPA. And CDP S.p.A[0] owns 51% of that Holding. And the Ministry of Economy and Finance owns 83% of the CDP. So it's just a convoluted way to say that the state owns the majority of it. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassa_Depositi_e_Prestiti https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassa_Depositi_e_Prestiti
Woshiwuja 2y ago
Highways are now public infrastructure again after buying them back from benetton. 8 billions euro. they got them for free. we just gifted 8 billion to one of the richest families. wow.
- giva 2y ago
  This is false.
  - Woshiwuja 2y ago
    do i need to link the news or can you find it on your own?
- oriettaxx 2y ago
  they have always been "public infrastructure", private entities have been delegated to "run" it (concessione), so nobody got it for free. The Benetton family had a (very lucrative) contracts to run many highways: yes, many contracts are now back to the public sector
manuelmoreale 2y ago
> Traveling by car in Italy is now expensive for residents, and the alternative roads are slow and dangerous. This is quite the generalisation. Slow? Yes for obvious reasons. The speed limit is a lot lower compared to highways. Dangerous? That's silly. Not sure why driving 70kmh on a country road is more dangerous than going 130kmh on a highway. It all depends where you're going. Some roads are plain bad, others are excellent.
- rozenmd 2y ago
  > Not sure why driving 70kmh on a country road is more dangerous than going 130kmh on a highway. If you hit the edge of the highway, you'll likely bounce off the barrier and survive. If you go over the edge of a national road at 70kmh you'll likely end up in a ditch/roll the car, dangerous at any speed.
  - manuelmoreale 2y ago
    If you hit the edge of the highway at 130kmh you'll likely bounce back onto incoming traffic that's also going 130kmh. Highways are less dangerous in general simply because of the way you drive on them because there are no crossroads or roundabouts or stop lights and the traffic is a lot more predictable. But I'd not call other roads "dangerous".
    - Gare 2y ago
      Motorways have safety barriers between opposing traffic. They're quite good at stopping cars. Trucks, not so much unless they're concrete, or newer steel barriers of higher class.
      - manuelmoreale 2y ago
        Yes but motorways are always multilane so there is traffic going in the same direction. And if I'm hitting a barrier at 130km with 3 other lanes of cars going at 130kmh in the same direction chances are someone's going to hit me.
haspok 2y ago
To be fair, Italy is about 7 times the size of Switzerland. Italy has the Alps too, although that doesn't explain the ridiculous prices of using the motorway in the Po valley... the only place that I know of which is more expensive is Portugal, which doesn't even have that many motorways, but for the average salary driving there is a luxury.
- pcardoso 2y ago
  In Portugal it is indeed very expensive, but one we have to deal with. There are no free alternatives to some routes. For example, one of the most common route in and out of Portugal (if not the most common), A25/E80, has no free alternative.
barrkel 2y ago
The Swiss vignette doesn't come close to covering the actual cost of the motorways. 10 million vignettes sold, 40 CHF each, ~400M CHF gross revenue. https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-new-digital-highway-sticker/48693860 https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/what-you-need-to-know-... 12 billion CHF over 3 years, 4 billion a year, improving current roads and building new roads. https://lenews.ch/2022/01/28/swiss-government-forecasts-12-billion-francs-spending-on-roads/ https://lenews.ch/2022/01/28/swiss-government-forecasts-12-b... Of course this includes all public roads, not just motorways, but the point stands: the motorways are not privatized and funded by tolls, the tolls just help a bit. And of course it gets tourists to pay too.

tomalbrc 2y ago

Expensive as it should be

manuelmoreale 2y ago
Care to explain why? Vast majority of highways in Italy are owned by the state. And we already pay taxes.
- epolanski 2y ago
  They are owned by the state, but they are not managed by the state but Autostrade per L'Italia SPA.
  - manuelmoreale 2y ago
    Yes. And Holding Reti Autostradali S.p.A. owns the 88% of that SPA. And CDP S.p.A[0] owns 51% of that Holding. And the Ministry of Economy and Finance owns 83% of the CDP. So it's just a convoluted way to say that the state owns the majority of it. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassa_Depositi_e_Prestiti https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassa_Depositi_e_Prestiti

Woshiwuja 2y ago

Highways are now public infrastructure again after buying them back from benetton. 8 billions euro. they got them for free. we just gifted 8 billion to one of the richest families. wow.

giva 2y ago
This is false.
- Woshiwuja 2y ago
  do i need to link the news or can you find it on your own?
oriettaxx 2y ago
they have always been "public infrastructure", private entities have been delegated to "run" it (concessione), so nobody got it for free. The Benetton family had a (very lucrative) contracts to run many highways: yes, many contracts are now back to the public sector

manuelmoreale 2y ago

> Traveling by car in Italy is now expensive for residents, and the alternative roads are slow and dangerous. This is quite the generalisation. Slow? Yes for obvious reasons. The speed limit is a lot lower compared to highways. Dangerous? That's silly. Not sure why driving 70kmh on a country road is more dangerous than going 130kmh on a highway. It all depends where you're going. Some roads are plain bad, others are excellent.

rozenmd 2y ago
> Not sure why driving 70kmh on a country road is more dangerous than going 130kmh on a highway. If you hit the edge of the highway, you'll likely bounce off the barrier and survive. If you go over the edge of a national road at 70kmh you'll likely end up in a ditch/roll the car, dangerous at any speed.
- manuelmoreale 2y ago
  If you hit the edge of the highway at 130kmh you'll likely bounce back onto incoming traffic that's also going 130kmh. Highways are less dangerous in general simply because of the way you drive on them because there are no crossroads or roundabouts or stop lights and the traffic is a lot more predictable. But I'd not call other roads "dangerous".
  - Gare 2y ago
    Motorways have safety barriers between opposing traffic. They're quite good at stopping cars. Trucks, not so much unless they're concrete, or newer steel barriers of higher class.
    - manuelmoreale 2y ago
      Yes but motorways are always multilane so there is traffic going in the same direction. And if I'm hitting a barrier at 130km with 3 other lanes of cars going at 130kmh in the same direction chances are someone's going to hit me.

haspok 2y ago

To be fair, Italy is about 7 times the size of Switzerland. Italy has the Alps too, although that doesn't explain the ridiculous prices of using the motorway in the Po valley... the only place that I know of which is more expensive is Portugal, which doesn't even have that many motorways, but for the average salary driving there is a luxury.

pcardoso 2y ago
In Portugal it is indeed very expensive, but one we have to deal with. There are no free alternatives to some routes. For example, one of the most common route in and out of Portugal (if not the most common), A25/E80, has no free alternative.

barrkel 2y ago

The Swiss vignette doesn't come close to covering the actual cost of the motorways. 10 million vignettes sold, 40 CHF each, ~400M CHF gross revenue. https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-new-digital-highway-sticker/48693860 https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/what-you-need-to-know-... 12 billion CHF over 3 years, 4 billion a year, improving current roads and building new roads. https://lenews.ch/2022/01/28/swiss-government-forecasts-12-billion-francs-spending-on-roads/ https://lenews.ch/2022/01/28/swiss-government-forecasts-12-b... Of course this includes all public roads, not just motorways, but the point stands: the motorways are not privatized and funded by tolls, the tolls just help a bit. And of course it gets tourists to pay too.