Construction of the bridge across the Strait of Messina will start this year, assures the Italian government. This mammoth undertaking that aims to link the island of Sicily to the region of Calabria is one of the most expensive and controversial infrastructure projects worldwide.
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00:00This work does not have any kind of public interest.
00:03We are people who occupy a space and who must free it without making many stories.
00:08The project is in very strong contradiction with the green development.
00:17To build a bridge over the Strait of Messina between Sicily and Calabria, in Italy,
00:22was already discussed in the Roman era.
00:24Yet the bridge over the Strait has never gone beyond a design phase.
00:31This year, the government of Giorgio Meloni assures that the maximum construction site will start
00:36thanks also to European funding.
00:39Too expensive or technically too complex,
00:42it has been part of the political agenda of Italian governments since the 1960s.
00:46The bridge over the Strait is one of the most expensive and controversial infrastructure projects in the world.
00:51Let's see why in this episode of European Stories.
00:55The bridge over the Strait of Messina
00:59The project of the bridge over the Strait of Messina
01:02involves connecting the Italian island of Sicily to the region of Calabria,
01:06via road and railway.
01:08With its 3,300 meters of central camping,
01:12it could be the longest suspended bridge in the world.
01:15It would also be an important element of the Scandinavian-Mediterranean corridor of the European Union,
01:20an artery that will connect Europe from north to south
01:23to facilitate the movement of people and goods.
01:26According to the latest estimates, this pharaonic work would cost 13.5 billion euros.
01:31The European Union has allocated 25 million
01:34to cover half of the costs of the project of the railway part of the bridge.
01:39The government intends to use part of other European funds
01:43intended for the development of the most disadvantaged regions of the south
01:47to cover the last increase in the costs of the bridge.
01:50Critics say that the area in which it should be built
01:54is known for its high seismic activity, raising security issues.
02:10The project of the bridge over the Strait of Messina between Sicily and Calabria
02:14has been facing the strong resistance of the local population for years,
02:18for which national and European funds should be spent
02:22to provide basic services and restart the local economy.
02:27In the extreme northeast of Sicily,
02:30in the closest point to Calabria,
02:32I met one of the historical voices against the bridge.
02:37Gino has been organizing and participating in demonstrations against infrastructure for 20 years.
02:45Here, hundreds of houses will be expropriated.
02:49Here we are exactly at the point where the Sicilian side tower would rise.
02:54There are 400 meters of tower with a devastating impact on the landscape.
03:04The No Bridge Committee underlines that the project does not present
03:08all the hydrological, seismic and landscape investigations necessary.
03:14It denounces irregularities in the procedures and dismantles the public utility of the project.
03:20Local communities have no voice in the chapter
03:23and would never have chosen to do such a project,
03:27to invest 15 billion in a territory where some essential needs remain.
03:35We have recently experienced a summer without water in the Rubiletto.
03:41It would be enough to spend part of the money on the bridge
03:47to restore the entire water network,
03:50not to mention the health aspects,
03:53the issue of schools, buildings and seismic safety.
04:01I crossed the narrow port in 30 minutes.
04:05The project of the bridge would involve the disappearance of this service
04:09to facilitate the passage by train.
04:13In Calabria, I met the founder of a committee of residents who will be expropriated.
04:18Their homes arise where the pylon is located, a few meters from a seismic fault.
04:24When nature tells you that there is an active fault,
04:27that there are problems with the cables,
04:29we ask ourselves, as simple people,
04:32if this is the most important project in the world,
04:36why does the project always fail at every step?
04:41A project that is always approved with prescriptions and recommendations
04:45makes us fear that the level of guarantee of the manufacture is not sufficient.
04:52In 2009, in anticipation of the construction of the bridge,
04:55a short stretch of railway was moved a few meters from the house of Rossella.
05:01A work worth 26 million euros,
05:03which for the residents is the first eco-monster created by the bridge.
05:08What we fear most is the unfulfillment,
05:11the fear that at a certain point,
05:13when the construction sites are open,
05:15something can objectively interrupt the construction of the bridge
05:20and here we will be left abandoned to a fate of incursion and abandonment.
05:24Who would pay for such serious damage?
05:31In Sicily, almost half of the trains still run on diesel,
05:35while in Calabria at high speed it could never arrive.
05:39And then the controversial project of the bridge between Sicily and Calabria
05:42is really a strategic work for Europe and Italy.
05:47I went to Rome to discuss with an enthusiast of the bridge.
05:54The president of the Association for the Development of the Industry
05:57in the Middle Ages.
06:00The bridge should be a strategic link of the country.
06:04It is the necessary condition for the construction of the famous European corridor
06:11from Helsinki to Malta.
06:14Sicily is the physical center of the Mediterranean.
06:18Those who leave Suez find themselves in front of the Sicilian ports.
06:23Those who leave Suez find themselves in front of the Sicilian ports.
06:27And they don't go to the Sicilian ports, they go to Rotterdam.
06:30So if we want to change this thing, the bridge is one of the ingredients.
06:36What sense does it make to reason in systemic terms when the basic structures are missing?
06:42By law, in Italy, it was codified that 40% of the spending of the State
06:49on infrastructure should be made in the South.
06:53Every year 40, 50, 60 billion are missing.
06:58This should be the battle.
07:00And what are you doing?
07:02The bridge?
07:03This has been going on for 30 years.
07:05This is not the project that costs less, that is easier to do, that is safer.
07:12It takes a lot of awareness to ask to leave immediately with the work,
07:20if there is no certainty that the work can continue.
07:26If you leave and you don't have that certainty,
07:29it's a waste of money.
07:31It's public money.
07:34The experts disagree on technical aspects, benefits, costs,
07:39and even on the procedures followed by the government.
07:42Doubts for which the residents say that their is a useless sacrifice.