Strait of Messina Bridge
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The Strait of Messina Bridge is a planned suspension bridge that is to cross the Strait of Messina—a narrow section of water between the eastern tip of Sicily and the southern tip of mainland Italy. Construction will begin in 2006 and is expected to be completed in 2012. If completed, it will be the largest suspension bridge in the world. While the bridge has been planned for many decades, the idea for a bridge has been around since Roman times.
Two ministers of the newly elected government of Romano Prodi (18 May 2006) have stated their opposition to the project when taking up office. Hence this year's planned start of construction may not happen.
The bridge will be an alternative to ferry service between Messina (Sicily) and the mainland at Villa San Giovanni in Calabria and hydrofoil service from Messina to Reggio di Calabria.
Current plan
The current plan calls for a single-span suspension bridge with a central span of 3,300 m (about 2 miles). This would make the span more than 60% longer than the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge in Japan (the largest suspension bridge in the world at 1,991 metres).Plans call for six traffic lanes (two driving lanes and one emergency lane in each direction), two railway tracks and two pedestrian lanes. In order to provide a minimum vertical clearance for navigation of 65 metres, the height of the two towers will be 382.6 metres. This will be taller than the Millau Viaduct in France (currently the tallest bridge in the world at 341 metres). The bridge's suspension system relies on two pairs of steel cables, each with a diameter of 1.24 metres and a total length, between the anchor blocks, of 5,300 metres.
The design includes 20.3 km of road links and 19.8 km of railway links to the bridge. On the mainland, the bridge will connect to the new stretch of the Salerno-Reggio Calabria motorway (A3) and to the planned Naples-Reggio Calabria High-Speed railway line; on the Sicilian side, to the Messina-Catania (A18) and Messina-Palermo (A20) motorways as well as the new Messina railway station (to be built by Rete Ferroviaria Italiana).
A construction consortium was chosen in 2005, with actual construction set to begin in the second half of 2006. Completion is projected to take six years, at a projected cost of € 4.6 billion.
Controversy and Concerns
There are concerns about the role of the local mafia. It is feared that organised criminals obtain a monopoly on construction contracts by intimidating competitors and bribing local officials and then overcharging for the work, generating large profits.Many also question the priority of the bridge, since some towns in Sicily are still without running water, and claim that the money used for the bridge would be better spent otherwise.
There are also those who claim that the bridge would be outright useless, since the local economy is already providing for the conversion of a local former NATO airport into a commercial terminal to export vegetables to northern Europe. Alternatively, a much cheaper revamping of the current structures is claimed to be sufficient (for instance, the ferry lines on the Calabria side are now accessible by trucks only by driving through very narrow streets, which are a tight bottleneck for transport).
Finally, there are concerns about the environmental impact of the bridge, its actual feasibility, and whether it will resist earthquakes, not uncommon in the region.
External links
- [Bridge design site (English version)]
- BBC News ["Sicily bridge constructor named"]
- [Transcript] of RAI broadcast Report about the bridge. ()
Further reading
- Fabio Spadi (2001) ["The Bridge on the Strait of Messina: 'Lowering' the Right of Innocent Passage?"] International and Comparative Law Quarterly 50: 411 ff.
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