The revised completion date for the N332 road widening through Benidorm is now 2017! The project, which began back in 2009 had an initial completion target of 34 months to widen a a 5 kilometre stretch of road to 2 lanes in each direction, but as with everything in Spain targets are seldom met.
The Ministry of Transport has allocated a mere 4.2 million euros in next years 2014 budget and the spending forecast for 2015/16 is far less than originally planned, therefore in reality the 2017 target is highly unlikely to materialise. How can it possibly take 8 years .... and that is being optimistic. The Benidorm section of the N332 is the busiest stretch of road within the Marina Baixa with an average of 22,000 vehicles per day in low season and over 40,000 in the Summer - resulting in continuous jams between Carrefour and the AP7/ Avd Europa turnoff.
Throughout the year you will witness a sporadic burst of work for a few weeks then nothing - the extra lanes are virtually ready and tarmaced but the problems are the bridges, which need to be widened. A far simpler solution would have been to just scrap the toll charge on the stretch of the AP7 between Villa Joyosa and Altea, which runs parallel with the N332, but that would have been far to logical!
It´s unfortunate that the politicians who decide on these budgets probably have no idea on the disruption it brings to businesses - I wonder if they even know where Benidorm is, sitting in their plush offices in Madrid. Tourism is vital to the area and by delaying the completion of such an important artery into the town it can put people off returning, especially if they have been stuck in the jams. Perhaps they could re- juggle the firework budget and one year do without!
