“We always want to be the first, we want to pass in front of the other, we are selfish“. This phrase is not pronounced by an expert in personal therapy. It is Luis Codina, transporter about to retire, when answering the question of whether we drive well, poorly or regularly on the highway. His theory is that we all like to arrive at our destination, but we don’t want to run into anyone. Something impossible, and more so now, with the highways, the AP-7 at the forefront, free of tolls, a fact that has caused an increase in the number of vehicles on the asphalt.
This increase in users has strained the always difficult coexistence between drivers of trucks and passenger cars. The problem is especially serious on roads with only two lanes. Some blame the others for the disaster. “The highway is more dangerous”all agree. But the accusing finger always points towards someone else’s steering wheel.
It is eleven o’clock in the morning and the storms that have fallen in a good part of Catalonia this Wednesday give a friendly respite to the municipality of Martorell (Baix Llobregat). On the highway, there are still remains of what was a toll a year ago. A yellow car with a ‘no fear’ label drives down the center lane and swerves several times. He tries to get into the right lane, deserted, but he doesn’t finish doing it. Drive in the middle of both lanes for several minutes. Pure crap on the road. By overtaking him, his scattered driving is understood a little more: he is aware of the mobile phone. This is one of the several scenes that this diary has found after touring 270 kilometers on the AP-7. Most of the recklessness has to do with a marriage that hasn’t been able to stand for years: the one with cars and trucks that play cat and mouse.
10 kilometers with the indicator
“Now the highway is a mousetrap,” he says Benedict Lake, a carrier of chemical products that crosses half of Europe every two weeks on a route that goes from Almería to the Italian Piedmont. Blame the growing unsafety on the asphalt to the “ignorance” of many passenger cars. John Manuel Esteve, with his ‘trailer’ parked in parallel, gets out with flying colors when he hears the conversation. “I have been 10 kilometers with the indicator on asking to overtake but the cars do not let you pass, it is impossible. They make you lights, they insult you or hit your brakes, it’s horrible“, he regrets. Lago broadcasts his complaints from the truck parking lot of a service area in Penedès, whose soil stinks of urine. “Now there are many more trucks on the road but they have not put more services: no toilets or parking and we have nowhere to go. That’s why the ground smells like what it smells like,” he says.
The law of ‘yield the weight’
Instead, from a black minivan, Joseph Basets He has another version of events. He is pure authority on the road, after more than 50 years running a driving school. “I have seen many barbarities in my life, but I have just seen one that explains what is happening very well,” she exclaims. “We have seen a truck in the middle lane, for no reason, because the right lane was free. They don’t know what they are doing, they apply the law of ‘yield the weight’: a car cannot fight with a beast like that, the trucks get in the way and we can’t do anything, “he cries. This is one of many. There are more. “One comes from behind, passes us in front and stops short. If my student went alone, he would kill himself”, she laments. And she makes a gesture with her nose to explain her reason for so many accidents: excesses and vices.
“It’s crazy, very chaotic, people do what they want and forget the rules“, describes Gabriela Teodora with her husband, Adrián Florín. They have more than 3,000 kilometers on them. They are from Almería, but they have just celebrated their wedding in Romania. They return home. “I have left the highway and I was joining the highway and one just got in front of me, we could have killed each other“complains the husband, who has abruptly changed lanes to avoid the blow. “The problem with trucks is that they are seen more, they have more responsibility… but they respect the rules more, they make more stopsthe cars are more tired and they do more recklessness”. The man gives the truckers a cable. But it is not by chance, he makes a living with this job.
Two lanes, guaranteed conflict
As soon as one passes from Tarragona, coexistence becomes complicated. The road narrows and is only two lanes. Trucks continue to move forward, but this forces passenger cars to brake because there are no more lanes. Other vehicles are stunned in the center lanes despite going well below the maximum speed and the right lane being completely empty.
Related news
“You have to watch the trucks a lot. They think they have the right to overtake and they don’t care what comes ahead. It doesn’t cost anything to cut back and wait a bit”, replies Dani Callol, another driver who rents refrigerators and traces, daily, the La Bisbal de l’Empordà-Tarragona route. “The problem is that the cars do not understand the dynamics of the trucks. We have the speed limit at 90 kilometers per hour, but there are others that go to 80. We go with the calculated time and if we can’t move forward we are late for deliveries“, explains Codina, who implores more education behind the wheel.
Codina’s daily life shows to what extent selfishness and individualism have conquered the road. “Before, I used to leave space so that the cars could merge onto the highway. But many started to speed up to overtake me and I stayed in the middle… They left me hanging! And you think… let’s see, it’s not hard to wait, a little education. In the end, you know what I do now? I pass, and they have to hold on… let’s take a fresh wind!“.