A69. The decried project to create a highway between Toulouse and Castres will be the subject of a demonstration in the Tarn, Saturday April 22. Why is this project arousing strong opposition? Explanations.
The public authorities are not overreacting: they fear, this Saturday, April 22, 2023, a new Sainte-Soline, this agricultural site where a demonstration against the mega-basins had degenerated on March 26 between police and opponents of the project. The images of the clashes had made the rounds of the media and shocked public opinion on several levels. This time, it is not the peaceful commune of Deux-Sèvres which risks seeing its tranquility be disturbed but the department of Tarn. More precisely, a sector between Toulouse and Castres.
Between these two cities could be built a highway in the years to come. The project is not new – it was initiated in the early 2000s – but it has been gaining momentum recently and is about to materialize. Opponents to this new highway are not lacking, however. The latter want to be heard on Saturday during a day of action. The risk of significant overflows exists.
Several associations have called for the rally for this April 22: the association “The way is free”, a local organization opposed to the A69; the national movement The Earth Uprisings; but also the agricultural union La Confédération Paysanne. The meeting place has not yet been officially announced by the organizers. RTL and Europe 1 all the same argue that the participants could meet in Vendine, a town located very close to the planned route for the motorway. From 2 p.m., a “determined march” will take place along the possible future axis, without the route being exactly known yet.
According to the Central Territorial Intelligence Service, between 1,500 and 2,000 people are expected, including “a hundred radical elements.” This note evokes a “high-risk” day and anticipates “sabotage operations on the various construction sites or infrastructures linked to the project.” At this stage, it would be a much smaller mobilization than in Sainte-Soline, where between 6,000 (police) and 25,000 people (organizers) had gathered.
This new motorway project is schematized as a new axis between Toulouse and Castres. In reality, the route would not start at the exit of the fourth city of France. More precisely, it is at Verfeil, a commune in Haute-Garonne located 25km east of Toulouse, that it would begin, to reach Castres, a little less than 45km even further east. The highway would then pass near many towns in the Tarn, along the National 126 which already provides the link. Along the route, four interchanges would be created: at Verfeil, Villeneuve-lès-Lavaur Maurens – Maurens-Scopont, Soual and Saint-Palais. At the same time, the existing one in Puylaurens would be redeveloped.
Today, connecting Verfeil to Castres takes about 50km, the time necessary to cover the 55km which separate the two towns, on the N126, a 2×1 road. With this motorway project, the State, the Occitanie region, the departments of Haute-Garonne and Tarn, as well as the agglomerations intend “to open up and promote the economic attractiveness of the south of the Tarn, while offering users a connection high quality secure fast train between Toulouse and Castres.” The presence of 49,000 jobs and 132,000 inhabitants in the Castres sector is a strong argument in the eyes of the public authorities for undertaking such a project. According to their calculations, between 25 and 35 minutes could be saved thanks to the motorway. For the defenders of the project, it is also a question of “restricting road traffic around certain urbanized areas” and “reducing the associated nuisances”, in particular noise.
To counter the economic and temporal arguments of pro-A69, opponents – mainly environmental associations – are waving several red flags. The La Voie est libre association – a local initiative opposing the project – questions the traffic generated by the facility. Based on a study by the Regional Directorate for the Environment, Planning and Housing (DREAL) Occitanie carried out in 2019, it only estimates that 7,000 the number of vehicles that would use it every day. A similar estimate was delivered by the commission of inquiry following the public inquiry, which estimates it at 8,000 per day, with a level of 11,000 in… 2045. And not all sections would be as frequented by the one than the other. The way is free also claims that the advertised time saving is misleading and instead puts it on only 12 to 15 minutes.
Above all, the creation of this highway would lead to the artificialization of 400ha of land according to La Voie est libre: a heresy for these opponents who brandish the latest IPCC report. An assertion supported by the Environmental Authority for which “the project appears anachronistic with regard to the current challenges and ambitions (sobriety, reduction of GHG emissions, less air pollution, halt in the erosion of biodiversity and artificialization of the territory).”
