the BUS-HOV lane between Alcorcón and Madrid

From January 2025, the residents of Paseo de Extremadura in Madrid They are finding out the hard way what it entails. bury four kilometers of one of the arteries of the city. It is no longer that the entrance to the capital along the A-5 has become a traffic jam nightmarebut in a dangerous road due to the urban ‘Mario Kart’ that has been formed. But beyond the traffic jams, the problem is that access to Madrid is being strangled for many people who live in municipalities in the metropolitan southwest. Let them tell Alcorcón.

Madrid at rush hour it is not an easy city to travel, but when you cut lanes on a highway and overload the detours that are already saturated at certain times, things get complicated. To try to alleviate the load, a BUS-HOV lane so that the buses could circulate from kilometer 14 to the Parque Oeste de Alcorcón. And, although it is said that “the most difficult of the works has already happened”, the reality is that there is an interesting bottleneck between the capital and cities like Alcorcón, Móstoles or Boadilla.

And, as it could not be otherwise, that BUS-HOV lane has become a source of dispute between the town councils of Alcorcón and Madrid.

A road as a throwing weapon

In this story there is a crossover of accusations. On the one hand, from Alcorcón, criticism that the works and measures implemented are causing delays in one of the most important commercial points in the city. The reason is that the lane that was made available for buses is underused while private vehicles clog the roads.

And part of the problem comes from there: that bus lane takes up part of the roadpreventing private cars from using all the available width. And if the buses flowed, there would be no problem, but that is not the case. As pointed out The Alcorcón Gazettethe residents have asked that the lane be eliminated, returning to a road for general use, but the mayor of the town has insisted on extending the BUS-HOV lane to Príncipe Pío, now in the capital.

Candelaria Testa states in her petition that the expansion of the lane to the M-30 tunnel is “fundamental to facilitate the connection of the residents of Alcorcón with the capital.” However, and as the newspaper reports, the residents are asking for something else: to first decongest Alcorcón and then focus on the needs of those who travel to Madrid.

The Madrid city council has responded through Borja Carabante, Mobility delegate. As we read in The reasonthe official assures that “there is less and less left for the execution of the tunnel to be a reality”, ensuring that, by the end of the year, “all the buses will be circulating through it, arriving directly to Príncipe Pío.”

Carabante assures that Testa has been “putting spokes in the wheel of the work”, and in the end that traffic jam between Alcorcón and Madrid It has turned into a fight between the two town councils. The neighbors have disgraced the mayor for not asking the Minister of Transportation for solutions, Oscar Puentewhile they see how a political dispute is once again the topic of conversation while they continue wasting time and money in traffic jams.

The end, and unfortunately, is just one more chapter in works that are causing recurring headaches for both residents and those who need the corridor to get to and from their jobs. Internet, electricity and water cuts (Cheer up, mate Javi) have occurred without prior notice, the noise It is a constant and all that remains is to have hope in the great promise.

That “the worst is over.” If you pass by there daily, I’m sure it’s a comfort.

Images | Madrid City Council, DGT

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