THE TURIN-LYON HIGH-SPEED RAIL: A TECHNICAL ASSESSMENT

One of the best known cases of struggle for the commons in Italy, characterized by bitter controversies over the last 20 years, is the popular opposition to the construction of the High Speed Railway line between Turin and Lyon, designed to cross the Susa Valley (at the Italian-French border) and the Alps. This HSR project still carries, in spite of twenty years of continuous updating and reworking, a great deal of unsolved environmental and economic issues. The Susa Valley, situated between Maurienne, France and Turin, Italy, has been urbanized by the economic development of the region. The construction of infrastructures like the Frejus highway, the international railway, and a large number of dams, tunnels and industries, has generated significant environmental and social impacts. The proposed high-speed railway (HSR) line (Treno Alta Velocità in Italian, or TAV) between Turin and Lyon would pass cross the Susa Valley, via 2 main tunnels and several shorter ones across the Alps. Main pollution problems dealing with the railway construction have been put into evidence by several studies and official reports. Moreover, the insufficient cost-benefit balance, especially in view of the significant passenger and freight traffic decrease along the Turin-Lyon direction is a fact: the huge amount of public money invested or planned in support of such development does not appear to be justified by sufficient economic benefits associated to the investment. In other words, not only a sequestration and degradation of the environment is going to take place, but also there is no advantage at all in economic terms. The usual appeal to the Precautionary Principle in the case of HSR project is not even necessary. Economic data, energetic considerations, legal questions, environmental impact, the health impact potential, the negative experience of other projects suggest that the High-Speed Train Turin-Lyon is not an actual priority for Italy and Europe, and its construction should be immediately stopped. The most important aspects dealing with economic costs and claimed benefits, energetic considerations, legal constraints, environmental impact, health impact potential, and the negative experience of other projects, are discussed.