Spain's government explores extension of motorways between Malaga and Cadiz

The consultancy firm that won the feasibility study for the coastal train - WSP Spain-Apia - has now been awarded another contract, worth 689,000 euros plus VAT. The project, which has been granted a drafting period of one year, concerns finding a solution to the road issues in the Costa del Sol's network between Torremolinos and Torreguadiaro (Cadiz).

The Ministry of Transport has the reliable outer ring motorway, which was designed with ample capacity. In addition, the project to widen the lanes between Malaga and Torremolinos, including a new viaduct over the Guadalhorce river, has already been drafted. This project is in the environmental phase and is budgeted at 190 million euros.

There were ten consultancy firms bidding for this contract, which opens the door to study options such as expanding the capacity of the free motorway and building variants in certain municipalities, as well as creating new connections with the toll motorway and improving the existing ones.

The study will focus on the area between kilometres 1,000 (Torremolinos) and 1,090 (Torreguadiaro, Cadiz) of the A-7. The ministry's technicians have warned from the outset that a large part of the route of the current road comes from the widening of the old N-340, which has resulted in numerous access points from the urban developments on the Costa del Sol, "an area of intense urban pressure".

In addition, the A-7 receives high daily traffic. In 2019, an average of 65,000 vehicles crossed the stretch between Fuengirola and San Pedro Alcántara every day (the year prior to the pandemic taken as a reference). This number would grow to 93,945 at the gauging station near San Pedro. "The level of service on the A-7 does not correspond to reality," said the ministry.

To find a solution, the drafting of a study is proposed in order to examine the area "in a comprehensive manner", taking into account all possible courses of action. Potential solutions include increasing the capacity of the A-7 highway, reorganising access points through the construction of collector, side, or service roads, and remodeling junctions. "The primary objective must be to improve road safety and, as far as possible, reduce congestion."

Building bypasses in areas of high population density, as well as installing new connections between the A-7 and the AP-7 and improving existing ones, are also options. A combination of these is also possible.

On the other hand, urban pressure on the margins of the A-7 means that actions to increase capacity, create service roads and collector roads to reorganise accesses may, in many sections, be unfeasible "due to the economic and social cost of the expropriations that would be necessary".

For all these reasons, the study must gather the basic data necessary to diagnose the current state of the A-7/AP-7 corridor: geometry, traffic, non-compliance with the current layout regulations, accident rate, etc. It must also characterise, from the physical point of view (topography, geology, hydrology, etc.); urban and environmental (protected areas, wildlife corridors, areas of interest for fauna and flora, cultural heritage, landscape, natural paths and roads, etc.) the territory where the different alternatives for action are proposed, so that the capacity to accommodate a new infrastructure or an expansion of the existing one can be determined.

Additionally, it will be necessary to understand the initiatives and plans of other administrations with concurrent competences in the study area to act in coordination and establish synergies. It will also be necessary to design the possible alternatives for action, quantify the construction costs, including expropriations, and the subsequent conservation and operation of each alternative.

In addition to this, a study of traffic in the current situation and possible alternatives for action will be carried out to assess their potential for improving the level of service on the A-7. An analysis of the viable alternatives will consider economic factors (initial investment and maintenance costs); functional factors (improvement in service levels, improvement in expected accident rates, difficulty and construction time); territorial factors (compatibility with planning, area of expropriation on urban or developable land, etc.) and environmental factors (weighting of occupation areas according to the environmental value of the land affected, impact on protected areas and cultural heritage, etc.).

Finally, a cost-benefit comparison will be carried out with the aim of determining the profitability of the improvement alternatives, based on factors such as the reduction of travel times and vehicle operating costs; reduction of accidents; noise externalities, etc. In short, the preliminary study must determine the best possible alternative, ensuring that it is socio-economically profitable and that it is technically and environmentally feasible, so that, in a subsequent phase, it can continue with the development of the necessary studies until the start of the work.