The Strait of Messina: This is where Sicily is to be connected to Calabria.
Image: Picture Alliance
The Italian government is making a new attempt to connect Sicily to the mainland. She wants to build the largest cable-stayed bridge in the world for more than 13 billion euros – and is already thinking about the name.
Only the Romans are said to have managed it: According to some historians, in 251 BC they built a floating wooden bridge between Sicily and Calabria and thus brought dozens of elephants to the mainland, which they had conquered in a battle against Carthage. Since then there have been a number of attempts to create a fixed connection across the Straits of Messina, but they all failed.
Christian Schubert
Economic correspondent for Italy and Greece.
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The government of Giorgia Meloni and her tireless infrastructure minister Matteo Salvini are now starting a new attempt. Salvini recently said that work on the world’s largest so-called cable-stayed bridge could begin in about a year. The connection should go into operation in 2030 – hanging on two bridge piers almost 400 meters high, more than 3600 meters long and 65 meters above sea level, so that large cruise ships can also find space underneath.