FGV reduces the closing time of the barriers at Beniardá level crossing to reduce traffic jams

From next week, the barriers of the level crossing of Beniardá Avenue will remain closed less time each time the TRAM goes from the intermodal stop to Benidorm station, thus improving “road safety” and “reducing the traffic jams "that currently occur in the area, mainly in" rush hours. " This has been moved today by the Councilor for Mobility, José Ramón González de Zárate, who explained that the General Directorate of Public Works, Transportation and Sustainable Mobility has instructed Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat Valenciana (FGV) to introduce “a change of software ”that reduces the closing time of the level crossing barriers from“ 7 minutes to a maximum of 2 ”.

De Zárate recalled that, as stated by the municipal reports, the implementation of the intermodal stop has meant an increase in the frequency of train passes and the closing time of the barriers, which in some cases reaches 7 minutes In fact, there are times of the day when the passage of the vehicle of Line 1 Alicante-Benidorm and that of Line 9 Benidorm-Dénia occurs so often, that in 20 minutes the barriers descend up to three times, with a time of total closing of 14 minutes. This translates into queues of vehicles that can exceed 400 meters, collapsing access to Benidorm from the CV-70, and even from the variant of the N-332, with the resulting "road safety problems."

As stressed by the mayor, with this "temporary solution disappears road safety problems, traffic collapse and despair of drivers" who pass through this point: an average of 26,000 daily.

De Zárate thanked "the new general director of Public Works, Transport and Sustainable Mobility, Roser Obrer, who in just two months has sought a provisional solution that we were previously denied, and that looks at Benidorm as it deserves." At this point he recalled that "we had 3 years with this problem, with meetings and plenary agreements in between, without the previous heads of the Department responded to our request." The councillor has extended his thanks to the FGV technicians.

Likewise, this provisional solution - “practically with zero cost” - is “very important” and will have immediate effects on the traffic in the area, until the Department determines how to definitively solve the problem. In this regard, he recalled that the City Council is committed to the conversion of the TRAM as it passes through Benidorm in a train. Thus, the current crossings at Beniardá and Italia street would be eliminated, and replace them with traffic lights identical to those that operate in Villajoyosa, El Campello or Denia, making the circulation much more flowing. A solution that has already been applied in practically all of Line 1, and also in 9 in Dénia.

For now, the Ministry has tendered a contract for the drafting of a project to suppress the level crossings of the entire Valencian Community. Within this project, of which "we want to participate", "we know that our level crossings of Beniardá and Italia street are priority," he added. It is planned that this project on the level crossing commissioned will now be ready in 2020 for execution in the following years.