Expert clarifies

Making sense of the Styrian roadworks jungle

There are always traffic jams on the Joanneumring.

(Bild: Christian Jauschowetz)

There is currently excavation and construction work going on everywhere on Styrian roads. What you need to bear in mind.

For many Styrians, the journey to work is turning into a veritable roadworks slalom. It is not uncommon for patience to be severely tested - for example on the Joanneumring in Graz, where lanes are repeatedly narrowed to one lane. But when are lanes or entire roads allowed to be closed or blocked by construction machinery? Are construction companies allowed to do this on a whim? Of course not.

A permit is required
If traffic is affected by work on or next to a road, a permit is required in accordance with Section 90 of the Road Traffic Regulations (StVO). "The company carrying out the work must submit a corresponding application to the district authority, the municipal council or the responsible municipality," explains Robert Rast, Head of the Road Infrastructure Unit in Department 16 of the provincial government.

The decisive factor is always what conditions the construction company carrying out the work has in its permit. As a rule, however, one lane should always be open.

Robert Rast, Leiter Referat Straßeninfrastruktur A 16

The traffic management is then assessed with the involvement of an expert from the authority, "is a half-sided closure sufficient or does the road have to be completely closed? "They also assess what is reasonable? Are there alternative routes? How busy is the section of road and so on," explains Rast. According to the expert, one lane must remain open as a rule, but a waiting time of around five minutes is reasonable. "But the bottom line is that it's always a case-by-case assessment."

By the way, just for context: there are currently 485 roadworks in Graz alone.