Cai launches a flash mob: “Respect, no motorbikes on the paths” Umbrian

The appointment is set for Saturday 25 May at 7pm in Piazza del Comune in Assisi

ROME – The Italian Alpine Club announces a flash mob, entitled “Respect! No motorbikes on the paths”, to reiterate its clear opposition to the regional regulation which since last January allows the Umbrian paths to be traveled with motorized vehicles. This year the meeting of CAI delegates is taking place in Assisi and represents a further opportunity to ask the Umbria Region to respect the work of the members involved on a voluntary basis in the maintenance of the paths, the bottom of which is seriously damaged from the passage of motor vehicles. The hmob flas, in which over 1,200 Delegates of the CAI Sections from all over Italy, the general president Antonio Montani, the members of the Central Steering Committee and the Central Councilors are entitled to participate, is set for Saturday 25 May at 7pm in Piazza del Comune.< br>

In Umbria the volunteers of the CAI Sections take care of the maintenance of 447 routes, for a total of 3,570 kilometres, of the regional hiking network. A free work, carried out for decades, which has made it possible to conserve that heritage of roads in a natural environment used today by the Umbria Region to define its territory as “the green heart of Italy”. If we were to “monetise this work in hourly terms , a figure of several million euros per year would be obtained”, reports the CAI. The second aspect that the CAI wants to highlight “is the short-sightedness of the Region in believing that a promiscuity of use of the trail network by hikers on foot and by motor vehicles can bring significant economic results, beyond the damage caused to the bottom of the paths”. Where this ‘coexistence’ has been tested, it has brought “a drastic drop in the tourist presence of walkers and, after an initial surge, also a contraction in visitors with motor vehicles”. To demonstrate “the absurdity of the Puletti amendment, later approved in the budget law”, three months ago the CAI delivered a dossier to the presidency of the Umbria Region: demonstrates that the 10,000 euros for the affixing of prohibition signs, the only tool to prohibit motor vehicles from traveling on the paths, “are absolutely not sufficient, considering the quantity of paths”.

To produce and affix all the necessary signs it would take almost half a million euros, even taking into account that the execution of the works is the responsibility of the Regional Forestry Agency of Umbria at a controlled price. Added to this is the time required to create and install the signs, as well as the probable landscape impact. “Our volunteers, around 6000 throughout Italy, are at work all year round to take care of a collective asset such as the trail network, the first and fundamental light infrastructure that allows sustainable tourism in mountain areas”, states Montani. ” In Assisi we want to send a symbolic but clear message: it is unacceptable to have paths that are constantly ruined by the passage of motorized vehicles. We once again invite the Region to review a rule that compromises, for the benefit of a limited number of people, a good that belongs to everyone and for everyone”.