Cartagena City Council will not establish any type of ban on the circulation of vehicles in 2023 due to the implementation of the Low Emission Zones (LEZ), according to municipal sources in a press release.
Cartagena, the only city council in the region to have approved an ordinance on LEZs, establishes in this document measures to promote public transport and sustainable mobility to reduce pollution, but not bans, as confirmed by the Councillor for Sustainable Cities, Cristina Mora.
The Climate Change Law establishes the reduction of environmental and noise pollution as an objective, but does not oblige this to be achieved through prohibitions. Thus, the Cartagena City Council has chosen to promote mobility alternatives because «the city centre has no traffic pollution problems as it is pedestrianised and surrounded by streets with a speed limit of 30 kilometres per hour».
The approval of its own ordinance allows Cartagena to implement its own model and assess its effectiveness within the four-year period established by law.
The ZBE of the city of Cartagena will be the area delimited by two different areas. The first is the historic quarter, which comprises the perimeter created by Calle Real, Calle Carlos III, Calle Capitanes Ripoll, Avenida Trovero Marín, the Cuesta del Batel and Paseo Alfonso XII. Inside this perimeter, pedestrian use of the public space will be encouraged, maintaining road traffic for access to homes and garages, the transport of goods and supplies for commerce.
The other group will be the Ensanche, delimited by the perimeter formed by Paseo de Alfonso XIII, Alameda de San Antón, Avenida Reina Victoria and calle Juan de la Cosa. In this area, traffic calming will be promoted through the creation of superblocks that discourage the passage of vehicles through interior areas to reduce pollution and noise for residents.
All these areas will be controlled by systems that measure traffic volumes, sound and pollution, allowing decisions to be made about traffic in real time to reduce its impact.
