The missing highway

Whenever it was about major infrastructural projects, Austrian politicians weren't necessarily the champions protecting the environment - till today.

Now that Hungary is moving close to finalise its investment, the M85 highway, comes out that Burgenland, as a neighbouring federal state with Hungary, nor the Austrian Government, is not interested to extend the Austrian A3 to the border, to Klingenbach, to meat the new Hungarian highway. The official reasoning - frequently emphasized in the press - is to protect the people of Burgenland from the unfavourable effects of the new highway, especially from noise contamination. As a contradiction we have to mention that already is heavy traffic around Oberpullendorf because of the lorries coming from or going to Győr, diverted to this region, and in the future, the situation will worsen considerably because of the frequent congestions caused by the "dead end" A3, unconnected to M85.

The distance between the endings of the two highways is 6,8 km only. A gap of 6.800 meters, representing the lack of good neighbours relationship.

Original: Martos Péter: Ahol hiányzik az autópálya (extract)