During a question session in the Senate, the Italian minister of transport announced that the Tenda road tunnel – which links the Piedmont region in Italy to France – will reopen to traffic on Friday 27 June 2025, after years of closures and delays caused by expansion works and the damage inflicted by storm Alex in 2020. The minister specified that, at first, traffic will be regulated by traffic lights and limited to alternating one-way flow.
The tunnel that will be reopened is a new one, referred to as Tenda-bis, while the old tunnel will remain in use as a service conduit, awaiting possible modernisation and reopening as a second tunnel. The Tenda tunnel is a key infrastructure for cross-border connections between Italy and France, forming part of the European route E74, which links Cuneo and Turin with Ventimiglia, Nice, and the French Riviera. On a local level, direct road connections between the Vermenagna and Roya valleys will resume.
The Colle di Tenda road tunnel, inaugurated in 1882, served for decades as the main road link between Italy and France through the Maritime Alps. Stretching over three kilometres in length, it was for many years a vital route for both local and international traffic. As early as 1989, following a landslide, discussions began about the need to upgrade the tunnel, which had by then become inadequate in terms of modern safety standards and traffic demands. Over time, the tunnel was operated in alternating one-way mode, with long delays at traffic lights, and various proposals were put forward for its expansion and renewal.
Following a lengthy bureaucratic process, construction of the new tunnel – the so-called “second conduit” – began in 2013. However, the project faced serious setbacks. In 2017, the Cuneo prosecutor’s office seized the site as part of an investigation into procurement fraud and aggravated theft, involving seventeen individuals including Anas officials and executives of the construction firm Fincosit. The following year, Anas terminated its contract with Fincosit due to contractual breaches, including failure to dispose of anhydrites, and in 2020, after further delays, the final delivery of the works was entrusted to the Consorzio Stabile Edilmaco.
Despite the legal issues and delays, the old tunnel continued to accommodate traffic, albeit in alternating one-way mode. However, on 2 October 2020, storm Alex struck the area with devastating force: landslides and mudslides ravaged both the Italian and French sides, collapsing the access viaduct on the French side and rendering the tunnel unreachable. From that moment, the tunnel was completely closed to traffic. The damage forced a redesign of the project, which now includes the construction of a new viaduct and a shared access point for both conduits on the French side. The total cost of the works has risen to 255 million euros.
