Controversy over the new signs in Spanish on the AP-7: the ministry will review if there have been "anomalies"

BarcelonaJunts has denounced the Castilianization of Catalan toponymy in the AP-7 signs at the Congress. Following up on complaints from various users on social media, who have taken photos with concrete examples, such as Barberá del Vallès (with a closed accent), Montornes (without an accent), or the Girona Sud/Sur or Oest/Oeste exit (now bilingual), it already presented a battery of questions on Tuesday about the changes in road signage, which in some cases have gone from Catalan to Castilian. The same is happening in the Valencian Community, with Valencia (without an accent) and Alicante (for Alacant). In fact, the battle for the toponymy of the Valencian Community is one of the main battles of the current PP and Vox government. This Wednesday, deputy Isidre Gavín denounced "the Hispanization of public space" and stated on RAC1: "They are taking us back to Francoism". Gavín assures that there is "replacement of signs to add the toponym in Castilian when it is totally unnecessary, absurd and useless". He also frames it within the critical situation of the social use of Catalan. "Is this the time to do this? It doesn't make sense. Is the second channel of Televisió Espanyola being Catalanized and the roads are being Castilianized?", he asked. For this reason, they have asked the Ministry of Transport, which is responsible for the AP-7, to explain why these changes have been made. Miriam Nogueras also referred to it during this Wednesday's session addressing Pedro Sánchez directly.

The ministry has confirmed to ARA that some signs have been renewed "because they were in poor condition and to change the numbering of exits that were mis-measured". The AP-7 was a motorway with a concession to Abertis (Acesa) until 2021, the year it was rescued. Since then, it has come under the Directorate General of Roads, the current responsible body. The ministry states that 22 signs have been renewed, of which 20 are exclusively in Catalan because they are official toponymy and only two have been made bilingual. The DGC assures that it complies with the criteria established in the standard (8.1 IC) and that it "is evaluating whether there has been any non-compliance". "If any anomaly is detected, it will work immediately to resolve it".

Why are there bilingual signs?

But why is the signage on state roads bilingual? Well, because that is what Spanish regulations stipulate. According to article 56 of the traffic law, which refers to language, signs with text "must be in Castilian and, in addition, in the official language of the autonomous community recognized in its respective Statute of Autonomy, when the sign is located in the territorial scope of the aforementioned community." The instruction 8.1 for vertical road signage indicates that proper names must be written with the official toponym, and that it must be placed first in the community's own language and then in Castilian. The traffic law was modified in 2021 and came into force in March 2022, as a result of negotiations with ERC to include signage in co-official languages. The previous version of the law, from 2015, simply stated that the written indications on the signs had to be "at least in the official Spanish language of the State". However, toponymy already appeared in Catalan before 2022, because the Catalan road law states that signs must be at least in Catalan and, in Aran, also in Occitan. Furthermore, since 2017, the Generalitat issued a report legally endorsing the exclusive use of Catalan on signs in compliance with the legislation on the official status of the language and defending the exclusive competence in matters of roads and urban signage. In practice, on roads administered by local entities and the Generalitat, they have generally applied the criterion of using only the local language, instead of bilingual or trilingual signage, for space economy and because it does not lead to any user errors. The question, therefore, is why has there been this change in signage now, when Barberà or Montornès have appeared in Catalan until now. Vox has an authentic crusade against Catalan toponyms and already presented a motion in Congress in 2024 for toponyms such as Gerona and Ourense to be reinstated. It is also an offensive to change signage that, at the municipal level, has been periodically promoted by unionist entities such as Convivència Cívica Catalana, which in 2023 in L'Hospitalet denounced signs that were written only in Catalan.