Since joining the European Union 30 years ago in 1986, Portugal has built over 2700 KM of new highways and over 3200 KM of other main roads, particularly to connect north Portugal with the south. Much of this investment into the extensive network of roads was funded by a big slice of the 96 billion euros Portugal received from the EU Structural and Cohesion fund since 1986. This vast highway network has shortened journey times across the country and removed many rural communities in Portugal from isolation meaning that the country is more accessible and connected. Also, the new highways have contributed a significant reduction of deaths and in road accidents due to better infrastructure and safer roads.
However, in 2010 Portugal was hit by a great recession which led to the country being unable to repay or refinance its government debt without the assistance of third parties. A 79 billion euro bailout was put in place by the EU and IMF but Portugal struggled to with the terms which only made the recession worse.
According to INRIX, a global company which provides a variety of Internet services and mobile applications pertaining to road traffic and driver services, road traffic in Portugal has fallen by 50% in 2012 which is more than in any European country at the time. This is because many motorists, hard-pressed by the recession and tough austerity measures, cannot afford to pay the toll charged to use all Portuguese Highways. And controversially, in 2012 the Portuguese government introduced new tolls on 100s of KMs of road that were previously free to use. This left many motorists no choice but to leave their cars and use public transportation instead. Gonçalo Torres, an events manager, and usual highway user states that "People don't have money to spend on motorways. It costs me more in tolls to drive to Lisbon from Castelo Branco [220 KMs] than it does in diesel. The model aimed at developing Portugal from north to south worked initially, but, unfortunately, anyone now traveling on secondary roads will see how busy they all are".
Many firms and car owners struggle to cover the costs of fuel, insurance, and tax alongside the costs of the tolls, forcing a considerable amount of people to take their vehicles off of the road altogether and causing a plummet in car sales, leaving many of Portugal's highways empty and ghost-like. This decrease in sales means that there will be a decrease in production of cars and an increase in unemployment as fewer people are needed to sell cars which will cause further economic decline and prolong the recession.
According to international standards and Portugal's own national road plan of 2000, a highway needs traffic of at least 10,000 to 12,000 vehicles a day to justify its construction. However, there are at least nine highways in Portugal where traffic is below that level which emphasises that the development of these highways was not needed and that in fact, they are redundant. The public opinion of these highways is that too much money was spent on concrete and tarmac and too little of education and professional training.
Even though these roads reduce journey time and make Portugal one of the most developed countries in terms of road infrastructure in Europe, they come at a cost. The potential opportunity cost of not investing most of the 96 billion euros from the EU on developing the road network would be that the Portuguese government would have a lot more money to invest into education, building factories with better technologies and supporting Portuguese industries and manufactures as this would improve productivity and international competitiveness which would increase economic growth and ultimately help Portugal avoid its 2010 recession.
