News

A move to cut noise and exhaust pollution on one of Prague’s central transport arteries, Legerova Ulice, has hit problems. A section of the road was cut from four to three lanes at the weekend by local authorities in a bid to deal with one of the capital’s worst pollution blackspots. Predictions of traffic chaos became reality for drivers heading from the centre of Prague southwards across Nusle Bridge during the Monday evening peak hour when a top, level five, traffic snarl up was declared. The scenario was repeated again on Tuesday morning with some reports claiming noise pollution is even worse following the measure.

A special session of the lower house of Parliament during which the government will face a no confidence motion will take place on March 24, the house’s press office told Czech News Agency late on Tuesday. The main opposition party, the Social Democrats, tabled a no confidence vote over the so-called Wolf affair. This centres on attempts by the Prime Minister’s close aid, Marek Dalík, to try and put pressure on Czech Television to drop a programme about former Social Democrat deputy, Petr Wolf. The programme focused on allegations he obtained millions of crowns illegally. Mr. Wolf has sided with the fragile governing coalition in key votes. The confidence motion is the fifth attempt by the Social Democrats to unseat the government.

Up to 3,000 police will be deployed in Prague for US President Barack Obama’s Prague visit on April-4-5, Prague police director Martin Červíček announced on Tuesday. Earlier police estimates said that around 2,500 police would be on duty. Mr. Červíček said the scale of the police operation corresponded with that undertaken for the NATO summit in the Czech capital in 2002, which cost around 1.0 billion crowns with two thirds of that spent on security. The first of a series of meetings between Prague City authorities, police and public transport chiefs to make preparations was due to be held on Tuesday.

Czech local authorities have voiced their opposition to environment ministry plans to push through an ambitious shake up of the country’s waste and recycling rules, saying they are poorly thought out and will be costly to implement. The Ministry of Environment has tabled a plan calling for obligatory recycling of plastics, paper, glass, metals, drinks cartons and bio-waste with households paying lower waste charges if they recycle more. The Union of Towns and Municipalities together with the Association of Regions have attacked the waste initiative and also called for higher rubbish removal charges to help fill their coffers.