Tom Ewart Smith
THOUSANDS of workers will be left with longer daily commutes after a major landslide on the A-397 road.
The A-397 is the main connection between the Serrania de Ronda region and the Costa del Sol, but it has been cut off due to a landslide that occurred midday on Saturday.
The natural disaster took place on kilometre 31 of the road, in the municipality of Benahavis.
As a result, vehicles haven’t been able to use the A-397, which connects Ronda with San Pedro de Alcantara.
The Junta de Andalucia has proceeded with a full closure between the access intersection in Benahavis and the junction with the Igualeja road (MA-7304).
The road’s closure will continue for the foreseeable future due to the severity of the situation.
This will seriously affect about 7,500 vehicles who commute on the A-397 every day for work.
Workers now face alternative routes to get from Ronda to San Pedro and vice versa.
The connections between Gaucin and Manilva, or Ardales and Coin, take around twice as much time, up to two hours.
The Fomento de la Junta de Andalucia has suggested ‘it is technically impossible to make a temporary detour’.
“The slope of more than 200 metres high has been badly affected and it also has to be stabilised so that it is safe to pass through there again. The total duration of this situation will be several months,” the Ministry of Public Works said.
It confirmed that ‘an alternative passage on the road itself is not possible until the affected section is cleared and repaired’.
Juan Carlos Romero, a geotechnical engineer, has also detailed the severity of the landslide.
“Fixing this collapse will take several months. Temporary solutions must be considered, but a provisional detour on a steep slope with a transverse gradient of over 45 degrees is very complex. It’s undoubtedly a complicated and costly solution that requires careful evaluation,” the expert said on Facebook.
Work on the slope has already begun and the Ministry of Public Works has assured that it has deployed all its personnel.
The Junta is cooperating alongside a specialist team with drones to evaluate the upper part of it, and there are also experts analysing the state of the slope to act as quickly as possible.
Despite immediate action by authorities, there has been notable anger from members of the public.
Commenting on Facebook, Carlos Alvarado said: “These are things that happen due to the lack of maintenance on our roads. Many people, including government officials, have no idea about the traffic this road handles. But in the end, it’s us – thousands of people who travel up and down to earn a living because we can’t do so in our hometown – who get screwed over.”
Another user highlighted that the landslide ‘is a huge problem’ for those who commute to the coast everyday, while another claimed that many workers are now ‘left stranded’.
