Shafaqna English– In protest against trucks and tourists persistently clogging their roads, thousands of local residents closed down Austria’s Brenner motorway on Saturday(30 May 2026)—a vital north-south passage through the Alps between Germany and Italy.
Leading the protest was Karl Muehlsteiger, mayor of Gries am Brenner, a town situated in the shadow of the road that snakes through the narrow, steep-sided Wipp Valley on giant concrete stilts.
The problem of excessive traffic and pollution in the valley, which leads to the Brenner Pass, has been a point of tension between Austria and Germany for decades. Local officials in the Austrian state of Tyrol have implemented various measures to reduce the flow, frequently triggering loud complaints from across the border.
Source: Reuters