«The economy is not smart working but movement. Of goods, of ideas, of development projects. And Lombardy may be a locomotive, but it is hungry for great roads.” Gianantonio Arnoldi takes the motorway to illustrate the future of successful infrastructures and to defend the A35 Brebemi (the Brescia-Bergamo-Milan motorway), the Lombard Pedemontana, the Teem (the external ring road of Milan) from the concentric attacks of a certain scooter leftists, who from the damask sofas consider those works expensive, polluting, little frequented, therefore essentially useless. The latest accusation concerns the accounts in the red and the protective umbrella on the part of the State, therefore of the taxpayers who already pay the toll.
The CEO of Cal (Lombardy motorway concessions) opens the books on the desk and spreads his arms. «It is absolutely false. The three Lombardy motorways in question cost 4.6 billion euros, approximately 30 percent of which was covered by public finances (1.5 billion) and the rest by private investors. We were surprised by the criticisms based on wrong numbers and assumptions, such as the losses borne by the State, which were totally unfounded. After less than ten years of operation, more than one billion euros has already been paid to the treasury between VAT, IRES, IRAP and other taxes. Therefore at the end of the concessions the State will collect much more than what was paid. Not to mention that the “project financing” instrument is used precisely to carry out important works, which cannot be entirely supported by the state budget, without burdening general taxation and public debt. Transforming a model that can be replicated elsewhere into a problem is truly paradoxical.”
It is curious to note how this example of “highway federalism” it was launched in 2007 with the government of Romano Prodi in agreement with the Lombardy Region, to favor the system of large transport networks, with infrastructures then blocked by migraine-induced ideological-bureaucratic encrustations. «In ten years we have transformed voluminous paper projects into public works» recalls engineer Arnoldi. «We have created not only 136 kilometers of new motorways in operation, but also 110 kilometers of ordinary and provincial roads transformed into free highways (with high traffic volumes such as the Brescia ring road), which guarantee Northern Italy new possibilities for movement and interconnection with the rest of the country and Europe. Would we be a problem? The problem was the A4 when it prevented us from connecting to Brebemi.”
While in the rest of Italy it is practically impossible to create strategic infrastructures such as the Gronda di Genova, the Passante di Bologna, the Tirreno-Brennero, in Lombardy and Veneto the situation is less critical. The interventions were planned decades ago and finally carried out despite the very long authorization processes, the interminable steps, the changes to the projects (see San Siro stadium) and the increases in costs, because in economics time is money. «Something went wrong elsewhere» reflects engineer Arnoldi. «But we focus critically on how much the cost of Brebemi has increased from the preliminary project of 2001 (700 million euros) to the testing of 2017 (1,750 million) and we don’t worry about how much it will cost to build the Gronda di Genova. It is a work that has been awaited for decades, the cost of which has gone from 1.8 billion of the preliminary project to almost seven billion of the executive project”. Three recurring criticisms of project financing are accounts in the red, high tolls and – due to transitive properties – the numerically unsatisfactory attendance of users. The deficit is completely understandable since the value of a strategic infrastructure is measured in terms of decades and not years. According to Cal’s CEO, the weaknesses could become strong points over time.
«It is normal that the budgets are now at a loss; dividends for shareholders will arrive during the concession, especially when the debt to the banks is repaid. A debt that is repaid at market rates also to important public institutions, such as Cassa Depositi e Prestiti and the European Investment Bank. Bottom line, they didn’t give away money but they made profits. I would like to remind you that Spanish and Australian funds and institutions have arrived to invest in Brebemi, giants who do not participate if they do not have guarantees of profit”. Now the group’s goal is to build the Bergamo-Treviglio, eastern part of the region, which is in the planning phase, again with foreign investors. And with the knowledge that tolls remain higher because the tariff covers construction costs and not just management. But the quality of the motorways is superior, the maintenance is efficient, the control is absolute with telematic monitoring, the technology is modern (“We’re moving towards free flow, today you can pay on the clock, what’s the point of maintaining the barriers?”) and the average cost per kilometer is still lower than the rest of Europe.
There is also an advantage regarding the greener approach of the infrastructure. «In 2023 Brebemi and Teem increased their traffic volume by 10 percent, decongesting the other large and small arteries” underlines Arnoldi. «With the reduction of polluting emissions, social and environmental benefits which in Brebemi alone are estimated at 1.2 billion euros. Only those who don’t travel on them believe that those roads are useless. On the contrary, highways are essential because transferring all goods to rail will take time. And Italy remained behind, far behind.” There is also an economic aspect that should not be underestimated. Brebemi and Pedemontana are a formidable driving force for the development of strategic production areas: in the territories crossed by the infrastructures there have so far been 84 new settlements of large Italian and multinational companies in the logistics, manufacturing and chemical-pharmaceutical sectors. Esselunga, Porsche, DHL, Amazon, MD and Italtrans have installed their logistics and research centers in those areas, with thousands of jobs and greater ease in achieving market objectives.
«The experience of the Lombardy regional motorways is a virtuous and successful example», concludes Arnoldi. «A system that has modernized the Italian motorway network and which will contribute with direct and indirect benefits to maintaining the sustainable leadership of Lombardy. Not only that, it is also an example of how the Regions can independently manage, within a certain framework of national rules, all the procedural, bureaucratic and control aspects of a complex sector such as that of large transport networks”. For all this, the system must be defended from the utopia of an unfortunate degrowth which would be devastating for everyone. And from ideological attacks of convenience, which using the multiplier of social media show videos of the empty Brebemi. With a decidedly incorrect trick: they were filmed when it was not yet open to traffic.
