“The bridge over the Strait is part of a broader infrastructural context, which in Calabria and Sicily will see the FS Group invest 80-90 billion euros over the next ten years to strengthen a network that will bring benefits to Italy and Europe, having regard to the central role of the bridge in the project for the Scandinavia-Mediterranean corridor for goods and for the TEN-T Trans-European Transport Network”. This is what lCEO of the FS Group Luigi Ferraris, intervened at FIT-CISL conference “The Bridge over the Strait: Infrastructure and Transport to unite Italy”.
The modernization of infrastructure
Second Ferraris Italy and the South need to modernize the infrastructures that are 60-70 years old and to do so “it is increasingly necessary to plan whole-life projects, overcoming the logic of lots to speed up authorization processes and attract more and more private investors such as infrastructural and non-speculative funds, which can play a central role in the development of the works”.
In this scenario the FS group it increasingly plays the role of a real system operator which, specified Ferraris, will invest in Calabria with RFI “35 billion, of which 16 already financed, and 14 billion with ANAS, between new works and scheduled maintenance. In Sicily, RFI’s commitment is approximately 21 billion and over 14 with Anas, always in new works and scheduled maintenance”. Investments that will have significant impacts both from the point of view of passenger traffic than from that of the goods. From the point of view of logistics, according to Ferraris, it is necessary to focus more and more on intermodality and “on connections with ports, such as that of Gioia Tauro in Calabria, to allow goods to arrive in Europe in 10-12 hours”.
The upgrading of the Palermo-Catania-Messina line
Furthermore, always in Sicily, he recalled Ferraris, the FS Group is working on strengthening the fast line Palermo-Catania-Messina for which Rete Ferroviaria Italiana awarded today the tender worth over 1.3 billion euros for the executive design and construction of the works of the Fiumetorto – Lercara functional lot, concluding all the scheduled awards and thus confirming the objective of starting the construction sites before the end of the year.
The Messina conference ended with the speech of general secretary of the Cisl Luigi Sbarra, while Ferraris’ speech was held in the context of a round table in which the Minister of Infrastructure and Transport Matteo Salvini who recalled the importance of the bridge over the Strait for the economic growth of Calabria and Sicily and of the entire country, also for its contribution from the point of view of work and employment. (Ticker)