Immediate traffic checks will be established in Oiartzun and Irun to prevent traffic problems in urban areas

Traffic control measures in Oiartzun and Irun will be implemented immediately to prevent the recurrence of traffic chaos on the Biriatou border last week. 

As a result of the holiday return operation, traffic is expected to intensify in the next few days, with queues of up to eight kilometres at the Biriatou toll today.

The decision was taken this afternoon following a meeting between the mayor of Irun, Cristina Laborda, and officials of the Basque Government's Department of Safety. The agreement comes after disagreements over the Irun City Council's proposal to control vehicles.

They'll take care of Oiartzun's rural roads.

The Ertzaintza will establish controls in Oiartzun, especially on access and routes on rural roads, to prevent drivers from using these roads as shortcuts to avoid queues on the motorway, with the aim of preventing this traffic from reaching Irun and causing new traffic problems in the municipality.

The controls will be activated at the very moment of the formation of the first queues. The technical managers of the Ertzaintza and local police in the area are already working at the Oiartzun police station to determine the organization and coordination of the device.

The Mayor of Irun , Cristina Laborda, has welcomed the agreement and has expressed her satisfaction with the implementation of the measures, which she had requested in view of the risk that vehicles attached to the border would enter urban areas and cause further problems in the town.

In Irun, the filters will be installed.

In Irun, for its part, the Municipal Police will install filters on access to the municipality to channel traffic and prevent vehicles that simply want to cross that area from collapsing the city centre and surrounding streets.

The measures seek to ensure that last week's situation does not recur, when problems at the Biriatou border crossing caused up to 13 kilometres of queues in access to Irun and also affected alternative routes used by drivers.

The Basque Government is calling for the border crossing to be speeded up.

The Deputy Security Minister, Ricardo Ituarte, defended the need to address these measures in a coordinated manner beforehand and warned of the risks involved in checks or roadblocks. In an interview on Radio Euskadi, he called for cooperation with the Irun City Council and urged the French authorities to speed up border traffic.

Ituarte has explained that the Ertzaintza has made various efforts through Hendaia and the French State Police and Customs Coordination Centre, as well as with the Gendarmerie, to improve traffic, including problems in the operation of the Biriatou toll booths and the speed of opening barriers.

The Basque Government and the Irun City Council therefore wish to transfer jointly to the French authorities the need to increase the capacity of the border crossing and to speed up traffic in order to prevent the problem from returning to the Guipuzcoan side.