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.
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