POLITICA
On 14 August 2018 a 200m section of Ponte Morandi in Genoa collapsed amid torrential rain, killing 43 people. Naturally, this tragic event has raised the question of whether Italy’s frequently criticised infrastructure is up to the task.
The majority of Italy’s bridges, viaducts and motorways were built in the 1950s and 1960s during il miracolo economico after the Second World War, with the Morandi bridge being finished at the tail end of this period. These infrastructure projects are generally expected to have a lifespan of around 50 years according to Marco Ponti, an advisor to the Italian Transport Ministry, as the reinforced concrete can begin to crumble and the iron bars within corrode. The majority of Italy’s road infrastructure is, however, now more than 50 years old, meaning that tens of thousands of bridges in Italy have exceeded the lifespan for which they were designed and so could be at risk of collapse. No wonder then, that politicians are worried about further catastrophes in the peninsula.
Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident as Ponte Morandi is the twelfth bridge to have collapsed in Italy since 2004 - with five collapsed bridges in the country in the past five years alone. These include the collapse of an overpass along the Adriatic coast in 2017 which killed a married couple, and in 2016 a similar incident in Lecco, near Milan, cost a driver his life.
However, the collapse of Ponte Morandi is the deadliest such incident in the country in recent years. Why then, were the warning signs not taken seriously? The bridge has in fact been a point of political contention in the region for some time as a result of frequent restructuring and repair work. The construction was finished in 1967 but major repairs had to be made in the 1990s as well as considerable restructuring work which was performed in 2016. Due to the extensive work to maintain the bridge, Antonio Brencich, lecturer in structural engineering at the University of Genoa, suggested in 2016 that it may make more economical sense to rebuild the bridge rather than continue to pay the high maintenance costs and others have been expressing concerns that the bridge may be at risk of collapse for years.
GENOA BRIDGE COLLAPSE
– A Crisis of Ageing Infrastructure
By: DAN JACKLIN
in Italy