In recent days, traffic jams on the island of Tenerife have been serving as a weapon between the previous island government team, led by Pedro Martín (PSOE), and the current one, chaired by Rosa Dávila (CC).
Although the socialists won the 28M elections in the corporation, the pact between the nationalists and the PP handed the presidency to the former, who had promised in the electoral campaign to end traffic jams in 90 days despite the fact that it is a entrenched problem in the island’s roads, both in the north and in the south, and which has not been resolved for years.
Since coming to power, Dávila has announced up to 30 meetings with different groups, administrations and companies to try to implement measures to alleviate the congestion suffered by Tenerife roads. For now, few results have been noticed and queues continue to occur, whether because it is rush hour, because there are accidents or for any other reason.
Although Dávila acknowledged after the elections that the problem could not be solved in 90 days, he has stated that there are fewer queues than before. This same Wednesday, upon completing 100 days in power, he insisted that there are fewer lines: “Before they came to La Orotava and now to Tacoronte,” although he acknowledged that it was just his “impression.”
But beyond impressions, different measures have been implemented, such as avoiding heavy truck traffic at certain times, using a third lane of the TF-5 near Guamasa (starting next week) or an agreement with Ashotel (the tourist association) to encourage the use of collective transport or car sharing for workers who travel to the south. The effects of these measures have not yet translated into smoother traffic and some are test measures to test whether they work or not, but they are already underway.
Precisely the spokesperson for the Socialist group in the Tenerife Council, and former island president, Pedro Martinannounced this Thursday that his political group will ask that in an extraordinary plenary session the measures that the president has taken are evaluated in terms of mobility, because, according to him, “he has lied”, when “he has the job done”.
Martín has said that the PSOE wants to evaluate what has happened with “the electoral promise” of Rosa Dávila (end the queues in 90 days) because “time has passed” and they would like the president to “provide data” regarding “ his feeling” that “things have improved.”
“It is obvious that he does not take the TF-5 or the TF-1 to get around, and we ask him to stop making advertisements and selling smoke, and get going,” Martín criticized.
The socialist spokesperson has said that his political group is willing to support any initiative, that he will not oppose any, although “many” seem to him to be “mere fireworks.” “Does anyone believe that a crane arrives at an accident in less than 15 minutes on TF-1 or TF-5?” he blurted out, after Dávila announced last week that he would try to reach agreements with the crane companies. to ensure that damaged vehicles are removed within that period of time.
Pedro Martín has also criticized that the Padre Anchieta roundabout has not yet been finished, which is why, he continues, Rosa Dávila should “demand that the company finish the work and, if it does not, impose penalties.”
Regarding the withdrawal of heavy vehicles at certain times, he said that the Socialist group has collected data and that “only between 6 and 7 trucks are removed daily when more than 110,000 vehicles pass by per day.”
Pedro Martín has added that the Minister of Highways, Dámaso Arteaga, and the president “ask for caution from drivers”, an initiative “that seems like a joke to them.”
The socialist spokesperson has argued that Rosa Dávila “has the job done, because from the reports, the money to launch works that have been waiting for more than 40 years.”
“Last term we launched 120 buses in 2020, 248 in 2022 and we hired 172 drivers to serve them. Those buses that he now takes photos with,” he added.
Pedro Martín has said that the government team of the Cabildo and the Government of the Canary Islands are avoiding the solution to the road problem, because there are projects that “should have been put out to tender now.”
He has also assured that the previous government group has worked with the regional government to draft projects and have authorizations to launch the roads that the island needs.
The spokesperson requests to promote the work of the Erjos tunnel, as well as to finish the project and put out to tender the connection project between San Juan de la Rambla and Icod de los Vinos.
Regarding the ring road from Guamasa to La Laguna, he assures that the drafting of the route has been completed, as well as public information, an execution project, environmental evaluation reports and money to be executed and, even so, it is stopped.
Regarding the Fañabé project (Las Américas), he has said that it was a project awarded while he was in government, in January of this year, and he has the award of the work. To this project, he has added, a resource was added that “is already resolved” and he asks Rosa Dávila to set a start date for the works. “We tell the island government to stop selling smoke, taking photos at roundabouts in works that we have already awarded, and not to waste time.”
The lines, until La Orotava
Canarian Coalition has responded to Martín that the PSOE proposals “come to confirm for themselves that the former island president did absolutely nothing during his mandate to solve the traffic jams in Tenerife.”
“The great achievement of the PSOE and Pedro Martín during their four years of government was to increase the queues to La Orotava, in addition to resigning themselves saying that this problem would not be solved until 2028,” criticize the nationalists.
CC assures that Pedro Martín “was incapable of taking a single measure to improve mobility in Tenerife and, in the face of this neglect, there is currently an insular Government, with the nationalist president Rosa Dávila at the head, which in 90 days has done more than the PSOE in four years, as can be seen in the fact that more than 30 meetings have been held with the different economic and social agents of Tenerife and 20 measures have been implemented to alleviate the serious traffic problem that we have in the island”.
CC details that in July 2019 there were nine road projects that the Government of Carlos Alonso prepared to execute for an amount of 45 million euros. “However, with the PSOE in power, everything was paralyzed and slowed down,” he points out.
The nationalists also remember that “the only work that the socialists did were actions that were already scheduled and executed by the previous CC government, such as the works on the Padre Anchieta walkway, the burying of the TF-24 or the resurfacing of the northern and southern highways.
Furthermore, in 2020, 15 million euros in the Highways area were left unexecuted, they criticize.
Regarding mobility, CC describes the management of Pedro Martín and the PSOE as “shameful”, since “they voted against free transport in Tenerife”. “The government group at the time opposed a measure that has been shown to be good for Tenerife and its people, since the data corroborates it,” they say.
For CC, Pedro Martín, “at the last minute he announced unplanned measures, such as what he tried to do with the ULL’s schedules, a desperate and poorly worked proposal in which the Cabildo contributed two million euros to the Faculty of Medicine when there are only 66 students from the first ULL Medicine courses who are registered in the north of Tenerife.”
Among all these actions, they say, “we cannot forget the famous Highway Technical Office that they were going to implement, it lasted less than three months and they had to close it because it was a total failure, not to mention the disbandment of the Highway service, of which “Up to four engineers left.” The Highways area was in the hands of Enrique Arriaga, from Ciudadanos.
