The Lisbon Municipal Assembly wants to know the results of the two audits carried out on the city's cycling network - the specific audit of the Almirante Reis cycle path and the work done on the entire network. For Rodrigo Mello Gonçalves, of the Liberal Initiative, what is at stake is "having access to reports that are public, paid for with taxpayers' money, and on issues that are relevant to the city".
The Lisbon Municipal Assembly (AML) unanimously approved a recommendation that the City Council publish the results of the two audits carried out this year on the city's cycling network - a specific one for the bike lane on Avenida Almirante Reis and another for the entire network. The recommendation was presented by Liberal Initiative (LI)It was approved by all the political forces sitting in the AML, including the PSD and CDS.
The text, discussed and approved at the plenary session of the last December 5thIn a statement, he points out that the deadlines for the conclusion of the two audits have already passed and that it is time for the council to publish the results. "Access to the information that underpins the council's mobility policies, in addition to being a principle of transparency in public management that must always be defended, allows people to better understand the objectives to be achieved and the measures and decisions that are inherent to them"you can read.
A audit of the bike lane on Avenida Almirante Reis was commissioned by EMEL from the National Civil Engineering Laboratory (LNEC) in November 2022, with a deadline of four months, and a report is to be drawn up "indicating the hazards identified in the road space analyzed, the corresponding generic corrective measures, and the urgency of their implementation". As for a general audit of the entire cycling network was carried out by the international consultancy CopenhagenizeThe contract was signed in March this year and the work is currently being completed, according to the council.
To Rodrigo Mello GonçalvesIL municipal deputy, author of the text of the recommendation, to availability of these reports is "a question of transparency in the management of the city's policies and access to information by the Municipal Assembly, which is the City Council's supervisory body". "It is assumed that EMEL and the City Council itself are the owners of this LNEC report. And what we're proposing, given that it's been finished since April and we're in November, is that the City Council send the conclusions of this report to the Assembly straight away"said the deputy when presenting the recommendation to the plenary.
The text of the recommendation also asks the Chamber to "inform the Municipal Assembly of any measures already implemented or planned, following the conclusions of the aforementioned report" on Almirante Reis, and that the audit report on the entire cycling network, carried out by Copenhagenize, be made available as soon as it is finalized. The recommendation was approved unanimouslyIn other words, with the votes in favor of PS, PSD, CDS, IL, Chega, PAN, BE, PCP, CPL (Cidadãos Por Lisboa), PEV, Livre, Aliança, MPT and PPM.
Cláudia Madeira, member of the PEV, regretted the need for this recommendation "because, in a normal situation, the City Council should make the conclusions of the reports available"because it is up to this body "make known the studies and evaluations that support certain interventions". For his part, António Valente, from PANhe said: "We agree that the best options for building cycle paths and those that bring us the most safety should be sought. But we can't accept that studies carried out by external bodies and the delay in making their results known are an obstacle to sustainable mobility." For her part, Isabel Mendes Lopes, from the Freesaid, "more than two years into the mandate, the expansion of the cycling network has come to an absolutely irresponsible halt". "The famous LNEC study on Almirante Reis, where the cycle path that Carlos Moedas promised to finish is located, will have been completed months ago but we don't know about it. Fortunately, the cycle path has remained and continues to be one of the most used cycle paths in Lisbon. But for that to happen, it's essential that we know about the LNEC study"she said, recalling that the bike lane on Avenida de Berna has been altered without knowing the results of any audit.
Luís Newton, deputy of the PSDsaid that the party that supports the city's current government “has a position that won't change: we are for the full availability of all documentation relating to the interventions carried out in the city"he said - even though, however, the latest works on cycle paths in Lisbon are not being fully disseminated. "With regard to the speeches made as part of this mandate, of course we are also in favor of presenting the documentation and making it available to this Municipal Assembly. We have been critical in the past of the PS not doing this. That's why you can count on the PSD to vote in favor of this recommendation, which is more of a request." Socialist Miguel Teixeira said that "the PS will support this recommendation, as it supports any document or proposal aimed at better and more abundant information"questioning why the LNEC report had not been made available "at least" to the 8th AML Standing Committee, which deals with the issue of Mobility. Turning to Newton, he asked "whether this represents sloppiness, whether it is a breach of the commitment that members of the Executive had to present this document, or whether there is something that will not be so interesting to see in this study because it does not interest what was the basis and subject of litigation by Carlos Moedas and some political forces that accompanied him".
At the end of the discussion, Rodrigo Mello Gonçalves, from IL, said that what is at stake is "having access to reports that are public, paid for with taxpayers' money, and on issues that are relevant to the city". This is not the first time that Mello Gonçalves has insisted on transparency and the availability of documents, having done so in the previous mandate too, when he was still an independent MP. And before presenting this recommendation, he tried to access the audit reports in other ways. "This is not the first time that the Liberal Initiative has raised this issue. We've already done it in the Written Briefings to the President, where we questioned and asked, we've already done it in the 8th Mobility Committee, where we questioned and asked, and we've already made a request, which was sent in September, to which we've had no response"he explained. "So this is the last stage. Because we think it's important for the whole House to have this information. Not least because we have petitions about cycle paths currently being discussed in the 8th Committee. It doesn't make any sense for there to be reports and audits of the cycling network that this council has undertaken to do, and rightly so, and for them not to be accessible to the Assembly."
