Work, accidents, signs: the daily nightmare on Highway 554

The latest revolutionary idea came from a few weeks ago. To make the SS 554 smoother, with two lanes in each direction and a central traffic divider that is partially absent, the maintenance and intervention workers on this fundamental 15-kilometer long communication route that connects Quartu to Cagliari circling the main centers of the 'Hinterland have created on the ground (for orders from above, obviously) new horizontal white stripes at the points where the connecting lanes with other state and provincial roads depart from the main route. Practical example: it happens that the road at a certain height curves to the right (or left) and that the left (or right) lane "splits" into two following the normal path on one side and continuing straight on on the other. towards the artery on which it will enter as the acceleration lane. The novelty consists in the decision to make the part that follows the original route inaccessible, a prohibition signaled by the zebra stripes on the asphalt. Clear indication of the impossibility for motorists to pass through.

Kilometer files

The long and detailed introduction, hopefully sufficiently understandable, serves to illustrate the consequences of the initiative. It can be assumed that the decision is based on the desire to push the driver to slow down a certain amount in advance of the curve, as they are forced to move from left to right (or vice versa) given the prohibition to continue in the same lane and therefore, to pay attention to the flow of cars in the adjacent lane to avoid unpleasant contacts. Unfortunately, the practical test, as often happens, reveals problems that are probably unexpected and not taken into account by those who study the solutions at the table without verifying the possible consequences in the field. So it happens that, to say, one of the most densely trafficked stretches of the ring road - from the traffic light at the intersection with Statale 387 to the junction for Statale 131 dir and the median axis - gets clogged very frequently in the morning between 7, 30 and 8.30 (in a more or less serious way based on frankly incomprehensible astral combinations: in particular Tuesday is a black stamp day) creating long queues sometimes even two kilometers and more, with vehicles stopped already before Emanuela Loi bridge and traffic advancing at a walking pace. After all, the average pace on the whole route was quite low: the 2018 data indicated from 5 to 20 kilometers per hour.

Accidents and queues

In all this, a banal rear-end collision is enough, not to mention the most important accidents (and above all the ancient and unhealthy habit of carrying out the most varied jobs, including mowing the grass in the ditches, at the worst times), and the circulation goes haywire . It happened several times this month, in September, June, May. In short, always. The Statale is one of the roads with the highest traffic density in Sardinia and bears a load (40 thousand a day and about 300 thousand people, numbers for 2019) probably excessive compared to the period in which it was built, when the traffic was much lower ( it would be enough to observe the mass of cars parked in the queue on the junction for the 131 dir waiting for the uninterrupted flow of vehicles coming from the area of the former incinerator to create a minimum opening in which to enter). In 2018, statistics indicated it as one of the 40 most dangerous roads on the Italian network, with an average of two accidents per kilometer. Perhaps wider carriageways would be needed, emergency lanes along the entire route, a less bumpy road surface in many places, above all a traffic divider that divides the two directions of travel from start to finish. Instead the stretch between Selargius and Quartu is completely; the emergency lanes are found only along a few stretches; the bottom in some places, mainly between Quartucciu and the Margine Rosso, is in very bad condition (sometimes it crumbles). Instead, the solution seems to be to reduce the entry lane in those curves to only one. The result: a long line of cars on one side and vehicles that proceed at rapid speed alongside to insert themselves on the other side as soon as possible, often forcing those who suddenly find themselves in front of them to brake sharply. With the risk of a rear-end collision and being rear-ended (again in 2017, well before this novelty, over a hundred accidents were reported in that stretch). Meanwhile, the snake stretches out in the rear.

The accommodation project

Things could perhaps change when the planned revolution of the axis is followed up, already very late on the initial roadmap in the face of investments of over 400 million euros. The first novelty concerns the initial part, the approximately 4 kilometers from the coast to the junction with the SS 125, but diverges from the possible need to travel the route in a short time using a state road today with a speed limit set at 80 kilometers per hour. By the end of the year, it seems, the works that will affect the Municipalities of Quartu, Quartucciu, Selargius and Monserrato will begin with the construction of three roundabouts, the arrangement of the road axis and the connections with the "complementary viability in the territory". But the section between via Marconi and Quartello in particular will become an urban avenue with the elimination of the traffic lights at the two intersections between Pitz'e Serra and via Marconi replaced by two roundabouts and a third inserted at the exit of via Italia in Quartello, the construction of 6 lanes (three in each direction), two of which are dedicated to public transport, and a limit of 50 kilometers per hour or perhaps less.

The opening of the construction site is also expected to give legs to the maxi project, expected for over ten years, concerning the rest of the road. The road will be widened up to 20.30 meters (with two 3.50-meter carriageways separated by a central 2.80-meter central reservation) and the elimination of traffic lights, which will be replaced with 10 junctions and six roundabouts. Four will be built in Selargius at the entrance to Is Corrias, at the intersection with via Nenni and in correspondence with via Torrente and via Roma. Thirteen new secondary coplanar roads are also planned that will flank the state road and will serve to separate traffic and make it more fluid and safe. In 2018, Anas said that the works would start in the first half of 2019; in 2019 that the construction site would have started "presumably in the first half of 2020". We are at the end of 2021 and everything is as before. Except the amount of cars, which increased further. Alternatives, few. Passing through the center of Cagliari, Viale Marconi, is today the worst solution of the disease, given the interventions in progress to transform it into a one-way street; passing through Monserrato and Pirri is falling from the pan onto the embers; walking along the Poetto seafront means extending the path a lot (depending on the starting point), in the hope that even on that front you won't have to deal with rear-end collisions and accidents.

The mayors

In the meantime, the lines are being put up with, while the mayors of Selargius and Monserrato a year ago protested against "the preliminary project for the modernization of the state road", which they say "does not respect the 2008 program agreement", and against the limit speed at 90 kilometers per hour: "We asked for an equipped urban road, but it is turning into a freeway". In short, the times for the new state road are still quite long.