A new cabinet must allocate more money to the construction of new roads, road maintenance and management. This is what outgoing minister Cora van Nieuwenhuizen (Infrastructure and Water Management) states in an interview with De Telegraaf. Cutting back on roads, as D66, PvdA and GroenLinks want, is irresponsible, she says. “We really need a lot more money. That is inevitable.”
The VVD minister is already struggling with shortages due to the gigantic operation of renovation and replacement of bridges, locks and tunnels from the 50s and 60s. Van Nieuwenhuizen expects the costs to rise even further due to climate and safety requirements. In addition to this setback, experts already state that at least one billion extra per year is needed.
“More and more is coming at us. This is partly due to the fact that we are increasingly demanding," said Van Nieuwenhuizen in an interview with the newspaper. “There are all kinds of new things that we have to take into account. For example, we have to build climate-adaptive to prevent tunnels from being flooded with every heavy rain shower. Furthermore, cybersecurity has become much more important. We have digitized all those operating equipment that used to be manual or mechanical.”
In addition, fire safety requirements for tunnels have been tightened and Rijkswaterstaat is encountering surprises with projects. “For example, we had to deal with chromium-6. At such a moment we have to work with a kind of moon man, just like with asbestos, in order to be able to work safely”, explains the traffic minister. “We were not able to paint the Waalburg, because we were already considerably over budget.”
Whether the necessary billions will be on the table during the formation remains to be seen. Of the VVD, CDA, D66, ChristenUnie, PvdA and GroenLinks, only Van Nieuwenhuizen's party itself wants to invest more in roads. An analysis of the election programs by the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency shows that the CDA does not want to make cutbacks. The other parties want to cut back until 2030. D66 believes that 1,9 billion euros can be cut and GroenLinks even 6,3 billion.
“That is simply not possible, it is irresponsible,” says the minister. “Not only have we established ourselves that more money is needed, but we have received confirmation from external experts twice. We have a name to uphold. US President Biden has named us as an example country. Everyone who goes south sees and feels how things can be done differently in Belgium. We just don't want that.”
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