Transport Minister Volker Wissing believes that Berlin is not going to introduce a speed limit on the autobahns, POLITICO reports.
The Federal Environment Agency published a report earlier this year that said a 120 kilometre per hour speed limit on the iconic autobahn could significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Wissing rejected the report, saying most Germans would not support the idea. He said:
“People don’t want that. There are so many figures floating around. The important thing is that only measures that are accepted can be successful.”
Germany is the only industrialised country in the EU where there is no maximum speed limit on some motorways, a topic of ongoing debate.
However, for a long time now, approval for the introduction of a speed limit has been growing. Even 54 per cent of the members of the German Automobile Club, Europe’s largest automobile association, voted in favour of introducing a speed limit in 2023.
In August 2023, the German Climate Expert Council said that the government was failing to meet the 2030 climate targets, with problems in the transport and construction sectors in particular. Wissing said:
“What is striking is the large discrepancy in the implementation status and degree of concretization of the measures included in the Climate Protection Program 2023.”
Wissing is a member of the liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP), which rejects the introduction of speed limits in its party programme, along with the Alternative for Germany and the conservative Christian Democratic Union. Environmentalists and traffic experts have previously accused the FDP of representing the interests of the car industry.
