On August 6, 2025, Italy’s government gave its final, resounding approval to a project that’s been both a dream and a battleground for over half a century: the construction of the world’s longest single-span suspension bridge linking Sicily to the Italian mainland across the Strait of Messina. With a price tag of €13.5 billion (about $15.7 billion), the Messina Bridge is set to become not just an engineering marvel, but a flashpoint for fierce debate about environment, economics, and national priorities.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s administration, with Transport Minister Matteo Salvini at the helm, has trumpeted the bridge as a “prestige project” and “an accelerator for development,” according to Bloomberg. For Salvini, it’s nothing short of the “biggest infrastructure project in the West,” as he told reporters in Rome, and a symbol of Italy’s ambitions to modernize and compete on a global stage. The government’s committee for large-scale public works gave its green light, and the project is now closer to realization than ever before.
The Messina Bridge will stretch nearly 3.7 kilometers (2.3 miles), with a suspended span of 3.3 kilometers, surpassing Turkey’s Canakkale Bridge—currently the world’s longest—by over a kilometer. Designed to carry three lanes of traffic in each direction and a double-track railway, the bridge will be able to accommodate up to 6,000 cars and 200 trains daily. For travelers, this means a dramatic reduction in crossing times: what now takes up to 100 minutes by ferry will soon be a mere 10-minute drive, with trains saving up to 2.5 hours in transit time, according to AP.
The bridge’s promise is not just about speed. The government projects that the construction phase will create up to 120,000 jobs annually, a much-needed boost in Sicily and Calabria—regions long plagued by unemployment and poor infrastructure. “The bridge will create jobs, bring good engineers to the region and simplify transport,” Salvini declared, as reported by CNA. “It will solve some of the problems in southern Italy.”
Yet, as with any project of this scale, the Messina Bridge has its share of passionate detractors. Environmental groups have filed complaints with the European Union, warning of serious risks to the local ecosystem, particularly in the Torre Faro district near Messina, which includes a nature reserve. Migratory birds, protected habitats, and seismic risks top the list of concerns. “They must not touch the Strait of Messina,” insisted Mariolina De Francesco, a 75-year-old Messina resident whose home lies near the planned 399-meter-tall land tower. “What matters is the landscape.” (The Guardian)
Opposition isn’t limited to environmentalists. The civic initiative “No Ponte” (No Bridge), active since the idea’s earliest days, argues that the billions could be better spent on urgent needs like water supply and local infrastructure. “We sometimes only have water for a few hours at home because the water lines are in bad condition. The money would be better spent on essential needs like water supply,” said Gino Sturniolo, a Messina resident and activist. Critics fear the region will become a giant, noisy construction site for years, with little guarantee the promised benefits will materialize.
More than 440 properties are set to be expropriated on both the Sicilian and Calabrian sides to make way for the bridge and its connecting roads and railways. Activists and lawyers estimate that as many as 1,000 people could ultimately lose their homes—a deeply personal cost. While Infrastructure Minister Salvini has promised generous compensation, some residents, like De Francesco, remain unmoved. “They could offer me three times the value of my house, but that doesn’t matter to me,” she said. Legal appeals are already being prepared, with residents planning to file by the end of October 2025 in hopes of stopping the project in court.
The Messina Strait Company, responsible for overseeing the project, is bracing for a drawn-out legal fight. “(Legal appeals) certainly keep me busy because they waste a lot of our time,” CEO Pietro Ciucci told La Stampa. Yet, legal experts suggest opponents face an uphill battle. “The citizen is entitled to compensation but cannot claim further damages, nor can they oppose the realisation of the project,” explained Gianluca Maria Esposito, an administrative law professor at Sapienza University of Rome.
Seismic safety is another major sticking point. The Strait of Messina sits in a region notorious for powerful earthquakes, including the devastating 1908 quake. The Messina Strait Company insists that the bridge will be designed to withstand the strongest quakes and will not be built on active fault lines. Webuild, the Italian infrastructure giant leading the Eurolink consortium awarded the project, points to similar suspension bridges in Japan, Turkey, and California as proof that such engineering is feasible even in seismic zones. The bridge’s design, inspired by the Canakkale Bridge, includes features like a fighter jet–shaped deck and wind-permeable structures to enhance stability.
As if environmental and technical hurdles weren’t enough, the specter of organized crime looms large. Both Sicily and Calabria are home to powerful mafia organizations—the Cosa Nostra and ’Ndrangheta—with a long history of infiltrating lucrative public works. To address these concerns, the project’s decree includes strict anti-mafia protocols, modeled after those used for the Expo 2015 World’s Fair and the upcoming Milan-Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics. “We need to pay attention so that the entire supply chain is impermeable to bad actors,” Salvini emphasized, according to AP.
Another layer of complexity comes from the government’s intention to classify the bridge as a strategic infrastructure project, potentially counting its cost toward Italy’s NATO defense spending target. Sicily’s critical military bases and the bridge’s potential role in rapid troop movement have been cited as justifications. This move could help Italy meet new NATO requirements to boost military budgets to 5% of GDP, but it’s not without controversy. More than 600 professors and researchers have signed a letter opposing the military classification, warning it could make the bridge a target and require additional safety assessments.
Despite the mounting challenges, supporters remain optimistic. “The bridge could create jobs for young people, and maybe it could also change something in Sicily, where we always like to keep everything as it is,” said Giuseppe Caruso, a local resident, to The Guardian. The government insists that strong safeguards, compensation, and environmental mitigation measures are in place, and that the benefits far outweigh the risks.
Preliminary works are slated to begin as soon as September or October 2025, with full construction expected to start in 2026. The ambitious timeline targets completion between 2032 and 2033. Still, with demonstrations planned in Messina and legal battles looming, no one is under any illusions that the path ahead will be smooth.
As Italy stands on the cusp of making history, the Messina Bridge remains a project that stirs hope, pride, and anxiety in equal measure—a testament to the enduring tension between progress and preservation, and a story that’s far from over.
