Faro Council's Social Democrats say a new bridge to Faro island is needed “urgently, ”as this will "improve pedestrian and road traffic circulation, regulate traffic and increase safety."
This is the same statement as had been made time and time again over the years, while the current, single lane bridge continues to choke traffic and gently decay.
The Social Democrats also say that, "two years ago, in the face of the intransigence of the Government, the Mayor of Faro tried to unblock the new bridge situation and took on, as insisted on by the Government, a €500 thousand obligation, 20% of the total budget for the work, even though this bridge is the sole responsibility of central government.”
In fact the government bullied Faro Council into stumping up the €500,000 by saying that the bridge would not get built unless this sum was found.
The government back then, stated that "the work would be completed in 2018,” but there is not a single contractor who feels able to build the structure under the ceiling imposed in the tender document.
Faro PSD councillors have spotted that all the government needs to do now is stick to its budgeted contribution level and Faro Council will have to find more than its currently pledged €500,000, or the bridge will never get built – also that it suits the government to not spend the money when it can blame the local Council, especially one led by an opposition party administration.
Faro Mayor, Rogério Bacalhau, said in November 2017, in an interview with Sul Informação, that the works should start “after the summer of this year and should be completed in early 2020,” but this was on top of earlier pledges, usually made around election time.
Nothing has been done since apart from the November 2017 tendering process which drew a complete blank.
It is fair to say that the new bridge is needed but bureaucracy and blatant party politics have delayed its construction. Even if the new bridge does get built, it is still single lane so will cause the same traffic problems that everyone currently moans about.
Rogério Bacalhau said last November that the bridge "was expected a long time ago," not helped in 2014 by Bacalhau's dilly-dallying that led to the Council running out of time to use EU funds to pay for the entire project.
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