Highway to... Hell?
It was a dark and stormy night, and I was driving on the highway home. The rain slashed at the car and the wind rocked it as I kept well below the speed limit. More than anything because I could only see black space around me. There were faint lines on the road, and reflectors along the guardrail reflected a memory of light. As I passed incorporations and exits, the tall streetlights might have been nonexistent, tall dark posts they were, not practicing the functions for which they had been placed there. In places, instead of wicking away the water, the asphalt simply let it lie there for the car before me to spit on my windshield, making me even blinder. And for the privilege of risking my life, when I left the highway after eighteen kilometers, I had to pay €2.25.
This highway, the AP-9, is the busiest highway in Galicia. It connects Ferrol in the north, with Tui in the south. From Tui it crosses the river Miño into Portugal and connects with the Portuguese highway, A3-IP1, which goes down to Porto and from where you can continue all the way down to Lisbon. In September of last year around 23,239 vehicles used it daily. Construction was begun in 1973 with the suspension bridge at Rande, and has continued to the year 2000, all done in segments. Right now the bridge at Rande is having two more lanes built in both directions, and one more lane in each direction is being built around Santiago. From the beginning it was a concession awarded to a private company. So it has been a tollway from the beginning for the users. That concession was dated to end in the year 2000, from when it would become free. But that year, the conservative government of the region decided to continue the concession until the year 2048. In 2014 Audasa, the company that directly handles the highway (Audasa is a subsidiary of another company, which is a subsidiary of another company. In the end, I don't know who it belongs to.), earned over 127.8 million euros. In all the years it has been a tollway it has more than paid for itself.
But the money the company makes is not to be seen in the highway itself. There used to be one tollbooth for cars with the automatic beeper that subtracts the amount from a credit account, and four or five tollbooths with people at the bigger toll stations. Gradually, machines have been introduced. At times there is no one in the sole tollbooth left for people. Yet, when there is, that's where most drivers like to go because they don't trust or don't understand the machines. Maintenance is haphazard. In 2008 there were countless accidents just north of Santiago because of ice. The asphalt had frozen over one cold night and no salt had been scattered. The company was taken to court and lost, but it didn't do much. Now they scatter salt, but a car may still drive into a wild animal, a rock, or anything else the may invade the lanes. And, while now they do cut back the growth inside the fence that lines the highway, it's not uniformly done. The summer of 2006 forest fires burned right to the asphalt, temporarily closing the highway only after many calls from drivers complaining of lack of visibility and heat from the fires. Since then fires have still irrupted onto the highway from time to time. Like I mentioned before, there are no lights in places where visibility is necessary. And the places where the asphalt has been patched, regular asphalt was used and water just lies there, creating an aquaplaning hazard.
I don't remember the French highways at night because the week we were there we only travelled them during the day, but the rest stops were gorgeous, so I bet there was adequate lighting. The Portuguese highways, toll all of them, have streetlights at every incorporation and exit. You can see where you're going, and the curves of the deceleration and incorporation lanes. The asphalt is good, and the paint and reflectors light up correctly in the headlights. When you're driving north toward Tui on the highway you notice the crossing over the river Miño at night. Mostly because when you reach the Spanish side and the AP-9, those good things disappear and you have to pay much more attention to the road. One would think the economic crisis in Spain was worse than the one in Portugal when it's really the other way around.
And, since it would cost the government too much money to suspend the concession, this is the state the highway will be in until 2048. Accumulating euros is much more important to some than a safe roadway.
This highway, the AP-9, is the busiest highway in Galicia. It connects Ferrol in the north, with Tui in the south. From Tui it crosses the river Miño into Portugal and connects with the Portuguese highway, A3-IP1, which goes down to Porto and from where you can continue all the way down to Lisbon. In September of last year around 23,239 vehicles used it daily. Construction was begun in 1973 with the suspension bridge at Rande, and has continued to the year 2000, all done in segments. Right now the bridge at Rande is having two more lanes built in both directions, and one more lane in each direction is being built around Santiago. From the beginning it was a concession awarded to a private company. So it has been a tollway from the beginning for the users. That concession was dated to end in the year 2000, from when it would become free. But that year, the conservative government of the region decided to continue the concession until the year 2048. In 2014 Audasa, the company that directly handles the highway (Audasa is a subsidiary of another company, which is a subsidiary of another company. In the end, I don't know who it belongs to.), earned over 127.8 million euros. In all the years it has been a tollway it has more than paid for itself.
But the money the company makes is not to be seen in the highway itself. There used to be one tollbooth for cars with the automatic beeper that subtracts the amount from a credit account, and four or five tollbooths with people at the bigger toll stations. Gradually, machines have been introduced. At times there is no one in the sole tollbooth left for people. Yet, when there is, that's where most drivers like to go because they don't trust or don't understand the machines. Maintenance is haphazard. In 2008 there were countless accidents just north of Santiago because of ice. The asphalt had frozen over one cold night and no salt had been scattered. The company was taken to court and lost, but it didn't do much. Now they scatter salt, but a car may still drive into a wild animal, a rock, or anything else the may invade the lanes. And, while now they do cut back the growth inside the fence that lines the highway, it's not uniformly done. The summer of 2006 forest fires burned right to the asphalt, temporarily closing the highway only after many calls from drivers complaining of lack of visibility and heat from the fires. Since then fires have still irrupted onto the highway from time to time. Like I mentioned before, there are no lights in places where visibility is necessary. And the places where the asphalt has been patched, regular asphalt was used and water just lies there, creating an aquaplaning hazard.
I don't remember the French highways at night because the week we were there we only travelled them during the day, but the rest stops were gorgeous, so I bet there was adequate lighting. The Portuguese highways, toll all of them, have streetlights at every incorporation and exit. You can see where you're going, and the curves of the deceleration and incorporation lanes. The asphalt is good, and the paint and reflectors light up correctly in the headlights. When you're driving north toward Tui on the highway you notice the crossing over the river Miño at night. Mostly because when you reach the Spanish side and the AP-9, those good things disappear and you have to pay much more attention to the road. One would think the economic crisis in Spain was worse than the one in Portugal when it's really the other way around.
And, since it would cost the government too much money to suspend the concession, this is the state the highway will be in until 2048. Accumulating euros is much more important to some than a safe roadway.
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