Trucks crossing Europe’s busiest alpine pass may need to reserve

Truckers hauling goods between German and Italy through the Austrian Alps may soon need to book a reservation, after officials agreed to regulate queues and manage the environmental impact of traffic clogging the Brenner Pass, Europe’s busiest mountain corridor.

The plan highlights Europe Union’s latest effort to manage supply chains that deliver goods to the trade bloc’s 447 million people. Recent bottlenecks prompted by Brexit, Covid restrictions and climate change have snarled freight and helped fuel rising inflation. 

Leaders from Germany’s Bavaria, Austria’s Tyrol and Italy’s South Tyrol signed an agreement to develop a digital traffic-management system for the Alpine highway used by 2.5 million trucks last year. At a standard length of about 13 meters (43 feet) that number of vehicles would stretch 32,500 kilometers parked end-to-end, just short of the Earth’s circumference. 

Transit via Brenner Pass has surged from about 1.1 million in 2000 and now accounts for about 40% of all freight crossings in the Alps. The road runs through Europe’s customs-free Schengen area and reaches an elevation of 1,374 meters.

The proposal needs to be approved by national parliaments, but may offer a solution to political tension between Austria and Italy due to frequent restrictions imposed to help car traffic.

“It will be a bookable highway with slots like an airport, free but mandatory“ Bavarian Premier Markus Soeder said at a briefing in Kufstein, Austria, Wednesday. 

The Brenner Pass has a history of controversy. Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler cemented their partnership in World War II there. More recently, Austrian authorities limited transit at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, and earlier to stop immigrants.

A 64 kilometers-long railway tunnel system under the pass, the world’s longest, is set to take over some of the traffic once completed in 2032, for an estimated €9.57 billion ($10.5 billion) cost.