Valle d'Aosta Governor Renzo Testolin
said Wednesday that plans to close the Mont Blanc tunnel between
Italy and France for 15 weeks from September 4 for maintenance
work have been confirmed despite concerns about the related
disruption and economic impact.
There had been talk of the maintenance work on the tunnel
linking Chamonix to Courmayeur being postponed after links
between Italy and the rest of Europe were severely disrupted due
to landslides caused by extreme weather.
These led to the temporary closure of the Brenner and Frejus
tunnels between Italy and Austria and France respectively, with
heavy vehicles still shut to heavy goods vehicles on the latter.
On Wednesday it was taking over two hours to cross Mont Blanc
tunnel because of jams linked to the problems created by the
landslides.
Testolin said that he had talked to the company that manages the
tunnel on Wednesday and there was no change of plan on the
maintenance work.
"The last few hours have made it clear how vital the
trans-alpine link is for our region, for the whole country and
for Europe," said Testolin.
"Once this emergency is resolved, it will not be possible to
delay a serious political-institutional analysis of the future
of this piece of infrastructure any longer".
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © Copyright ANSA
