The cry of alarm has been raised for some time: the continuous passage of trucks in the city coming from the railway doubling construction sites entails high risks for road users. Yesterday morning that danger signal materialized in a tragic fatal accident that occurred in via Adolfo Celi, a few meters from the San Filippo junction. The victim is a 56-year-old, Francesco Vita, who was riding a bicycle. The collision with a truck belonging to a company working on a railway doubling site was fatal. From the beginning his conditions appeared worrying, the impact with the heavy vehicle was too serious. The man had been transported under code red to the Polyclinic where the doctors had reserved the prognosis. Despite doctors’ attempts to save him from death, his condition worsened as the hours passed. He passed away late in the afternoon.
The dynamics of the accident are being reconstructed by the accident section of the municipal police which carried out investigations along the stretch of Via Adolfo Celi, the scene of the collision, on the Ss114. The impact was devastating, the bicycle was smashed into two pieces.
It all happened in a few moments. For reasons that are still being reconstructed, the bicycle and the truck came into contact, the cyclist lost his balance and ended up on the ground. The accident occurred before the eyes of several people, their frightened screams were heard by the truck driver who immediately stopped the journey. Then the excited moments of the rescue, the rush in an ambulance to the emergency room of the Polyclinic and the hospitalization with a reserved prognosis. In the afternoon, hopes were completely extinguished. The commander of the Municipal Police Giovanni Giardina and the agents of the Accident Section directed by Commissioner Giovanni Arizzi intervened to investigate the site of the accident.
The inconveniences associated with the passage of trucks coming from the construction sites of the railway doubling, from Contesse and along State Road 114 are nothing new. The administration has already intervened with some corrective measures that limit the passage of heavy vehicles. Last July the mayor Federico Basile had issued an ordinance that prohibited the passage of trucks at night (from 11pm to 7am) from via Contessa Violante and via Contessa Eleonora. With the start of school, the ordinance came that prohibits the passage of heavy vehicles weighing more than 3.5 tonnes in Via Contesse, between Via Adolfo Celi and the railway underpass, during school entry and exit times: from 7.45am to 8.30am and from 1.15pm to 2.15pm.
A solution to alleviate the inconvenience of residents due to the passage of trucks heading towards the Contesse site for the storage of materials. Despite the measure, the inconveniences for residents have not decreased. Councilor Cosimo Oteri had recently presented a question with which he asked for the suspension of the passage of trucks pending the completion of the safety and covering works on the San Filippo stream.