Fining speeding with even heavier penalties is a must, if the aim is to make the roads safer. But it becomes a lie if the objective is – once again – to raise money at the expense of Italians. Maybe because the government’s aim is to raise another billion and 200 million euros to finance the bridge over the Strait of Messina: therefore to build a road connection between two regions, Calabria and Sicily, all motorists in Italy will be taxed.

From this point of view, Minister Matteo Salvini’s campaign to reform the highway code turns into a cunning ploy: providing Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni with the tool to guarantee local authorities – through the barrage of new fines – the resources that the government is about to cut (also to put aside the nest egg intended for the bridge). The reform that the majority in the Senate approved on November 20, 2024 is for this reason, in my opinion, a hidden tax. Here’s why.

The speed cameras after the sign with the limits at 30 and 70 per hour

Take the photo above near the title. It dates back to Saturday 23 November. A speed camera was installed a few meters beyond a 30 mph limit sign. We are in a municipality just outside Milan. The trap was positioned along a straight line, on a stretch of extra-urban road protected by guardrails, managed until a few years ago by Anas as a state road and then downgraded by the Lombardy Region to provincial. But the signs now consider it an urban road, so much so that before the sign the speed limit is 50 kilometers per hour.

Or look at the photo above, downloaded from the on-board camera of one of our readers. The image dates back to Sunday 24 November: the first 70mph limit sign, along a two-lane highway in each direction, is positioned a few meters before a speed camera with the colors of the traffic police, hidden behind the guardrail . Here we are along the state road 36 of Lake Como and Spluga. The speed limit on the previous stretch is 90 per hour. But until a few years ago it was 100 kilometers per hour.

The smart speed camera guys: report traps on the roads to us

How many cases like these are scattered across Italy? Surely you too have witnessed, during your travels, speed controls placed to make money: traps that do not seem to have the aim of making the roads safer, but of hitting motorists’ wallets (if you have photographs, you can send them with a brief description to [email protected]).

Finding yourself behind the wheel in front of a new reduction limit and immediately after a speed camera generally entails two consequences: either dangerous braking, increasing the risk of an accident, or a fine which, thanks to the Meloni-Salvini stratagem, will now be a blow in terms of money, points and maybe even license suspension.

New law: up to 880 euro fine and no driving license

Let’s try to do some math. In the case of the photo near the title, it is very likely that a driver will not be able to reduce the speed of 20 kilometers per hour in just a few metres. So if he doesn’t crash dangerously and is still going at more than 40 per hour (41 kilometers per hour is enough), the speed camera will give him this new provision: “If the violation is committed within the inhabited center and at least twice within a year, the administrative sanction of the payment of a sum ranging from 220 euros to 880 euros and the additional administrative sanction of the suspension of the driving license for fifteen to thirty days are applied”. This is in fact the fine provided for by the new articles of the highway code for speeds between 11 and 40 kilometers per hour.

How much you can drink to avoid exceeding the limits – by Alberto Berlini

If it is the first fine in a year, the fine remains between 173 and 695 euros, in addition to the loss of 3 points from the driving licence. As long as speeding is always limited between 11 and 40 kilometers per hour, otherwise the prices to be paid (rightly) are even heavier. But even in this case, the new code makes no distinction between motorists: the personal responsibility and possible consequences of those who exceed the limit of 11 kilometers per hour (as in the case of a speed camera trap immediately after the sign) are very different from those who exceed the limit of 40 kilometers per hour. Try to imagine a car crossing a country at 90 per hour, where the limit is 50, or at 70 per hour where the limit is 30. Yet Matteo Salvini’s code reform makes no difference.

The most hated “photokillers”: they are hidden at the exits of cities

Another money-making ploy is unjustified limits. 50 or 70 per hour signs placed where the speed can easily be 70 or 90 or 110. Unreasonable reductions on the motorway with 60 per hour signs, which if respected would cause dangerous blockages. Speed ​​cameras cleverly placed on two- or three-lane highways leaving cities, just before the speed limit increases. Thus the motorist who accelerates early, without danger to anyone, is photographed and fined: in the image above one of the most profitable “photokillers” in Italy, along the highway that leads to the new external ring road between the A4 Milan-Milan motorway Venice and the A1 Milan-Bologna. Thanks to the new highway code, managing bodies will be able to collect even more money without any reason. If not to make money.

Last October, Codacons, the coordination of consumer associations, calculated that in the first nine months of the year, traffic fines had already guaranteed a treasure of 1.3 billion to the coffers of Italian municipalities. While, perhaps by pure coincidence, a few days later Salvini’s League presented an amendment for the 2025 budget law that increases the funds allocated to the bridge over the Strait of Messina by 1.2 billion, bringing the total expenditure foreseen for the operates at 14.5 billion. At the same time, the same budget law calculates cuts in State transfers to Municipalities and Regions amounting to 3.5 billion until 2029. Sum up a bit yourself.

The Aci and the son of the president of the Senate, Ignazio La Russa

It is commendable that laws are passed with the aim of reducing too many victims on the roads. But at the same time, Minister Salvini had promised that there would be no more alleged abuses: from speed traps to dangerous speed limits for traffic. Yet they are always there in their place, even in his region which is Lombardy.

Fines of 800 euros: even if Salvini says the opposite – by Cesare Treccarichi

What is missing in Italy is an association or union that truly represents the millions of motorists (and not the car manufacturers). There would be the Aci, the Automobile Club, which is a public body. But also political. Do you know who is among the 43 national councilors of the ACI? There is Antonino Geronimo La Russa, president of Aci Milano since 2018, lawyer of the La Russa firm and son of the president of the Senate and co-founder of Fratelli d’Italia, Ignazio (in the photo above, in the center, with Matteo Salvini and Prime Minister Giorgia Melons). Geronimo certainly earned the role due to his abilities. But can you imagine La Russa’s son campaigning on the new highway code against La Russa’s allied minister? I do not.

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