Yesterday the Senate definitively approved the bill n. 705 of conversion into law of the decree on the bridge on the Strait of Messina, text that had already been approved by the Chamber of Deputies. Commenting on the free way to the measure of the assembly of Palazzo Madama, the vice president of the Council and minister of Infrastructures and the Transports, Matteo Salvini, has emphasized that, if "usually abuses the adjectives, but speaking of historical day, of definitive historical decision, waiting for more than 50 years, is absolutely suitable. We are talking - he added - of a work that will give more than one hundred thousand jobs "real", that will save to the Sicilians six billion euros per year in missing links".

Salvini has focused on some of the main issues of the project, starting from the cost to realize the work, explaining that "what is in the Def is a figure around 14 billion. The bridge will consist of a length of the central span of 3,300 meters, a width of the scaffolding of 60,4 meters with six planned road lanes - three for each direction of march including the emergency lane - and two railway tracks, for an infrastructure capacity of 6,000 vehicles/hour and 200 trains/day.

It has been specified that the bridge in the central part of the work, pairs to approximately 600 meters, will present a height of the central navigable channel of 65 meters for the transit of large ships, with a franc of 65 meters in presence of the maximum load conditions and 70 meters in the absence of trains and heavy means. In the note of presentation of the main data of the project it is evidenced that "the chosen solution will not preclude, therefore, the transit of the great ships, placing itself, moreover, in line with the parameters adopted in the matter at international level. The franc designed for the Bridge on the Strait of Messina - it is found - follows the design lines of the other great bridges on navigable narrows, which, even in case of strong wind, assure and guarantee the transit of ships of high dimensions. Consider, at the statistical level, the standards applied for the main bridges on navigable narrows, such as the Normandy Bridge (52 meters), the bridge that crosses the Panama Canal (57.9 meters), the Golden Gate Bridge (67 meters)".

It does not mention the bridge on the Suez Canal quoted recently, taking a topic, from the vice of Salvini, Edoardo Rixi, that - comparing the planned bridge on the Strait of Messina with analogous strategic works of the world - had lowered it to the egg of a ten meters and, evidently spaced, had remembered as well that, for the ships of greater size, there are also other routes of access to the Tyrrhenian Sea(of 4 April 2023).

Not that the references presented yesterday by the owner of the Ministry of Infrastructures and Transport are more appropriate. The Normandy Bridge, which was inaugurated in 1995, is placed at the mouth of the Seine River, not a crossroads of world maritime traffics. As for the bridge on the canal of Panama, this is a fundamental artery of the international marine traffics, it is assumed that among the various bridges that cross the channel the Ministry does not refer to the very recent Atlántico bridge, placed near the eastern outlet of the channel, that is realized in the context of the widening of the ability of the channel and, in this optical, presents a height of the light of 75 meters, and not to the anniversary more recent bridge An obstacle, this, which imposes the Authority of the Panama Canal to establish in 57,91 meters (which is not the light offered by the bridge as the MIT indicates) the maximum height of any ship intends to cross the channel, however sufficient height for the passage of the larger ships to which it is allowed the transit after the works of expansion of the Central American waterway.

With the Golden Gate the dicastery goes to fish even more backwards in time, since the work dates back to almost biblical 1937. Moreover the artifact is undoubtedly not placed in one of the primary nodal points of the world's maritime routes and however, while belonging now to the prehistory of modern infrastructure, offers a remarkable height of 67 meters.

What seems certain is that the "state" references taken into consideration by the Ministry are not entirely, or at all, appropriate. That there are no others?