Sicily, Strait Bridge work could cause Joachim Murat's fort to collapse

The terrace from which Joachim Murat must have looked out every morning to scan the horizon when he was King of Naples when he was at the garrison of Fort Beleno could collapse to make way for the pylons of the Bridge over the Strait of Messina. The entire military structure erected as a garrison and lookout point over the Strait could collapse because of the work that will be required to pull up the supporting structures of what is supposed to be the longest single-span bridge in the world. At least that is what residents and the mayor of Villa San Giovanni fear, as reported in Corriere della Sera, upon the announcement of the list of areas affected by expropriation to make way for the major infrastructure. Fort Beleno is not among the properties to be expropriated, but it would be swallowed up among the 20-year construction sites that would affect the area surrounding it. And it would be deprived of the view of the Strait: “The construction of one of the anchoring pylons of the Bridge, on the Calabrian shore, foresees, in fact, an excavation of 100 meters by 60 in diameter and 40 in depth, and this could have repercussions on the static nature of the Fort, which saw Joachim Murat, King of Naples, rule the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies for 4 months, right from the rooms of the Piale Fort.”

In addition to the preservation of the historic structure, Mayor Giuseppina Caminiti is concerned about the state of health of the hills overlooking the municipality. “They are fragile, at risk of erosion, our cadastral maps are all painted red, precisely to document the instability of the entire area falling within the location of the anchoring pylons of the Bridge,” she explains. And then, “The city will be divided in two, 55 private homes will disappear, as well as 1,400 pieces of land. Four hundred linear meters of waterfront will be swallowed up by concrete.”

The city council of Villa San Giovanni, the Courier explains, had approved a resolution in August 2021 to start work on securing and building a green park with funds from the Pnrr. “The Fort is an expression of our past, a piece of our culture, a historical asset that, however, the Superintendence did not intend to preserve, excluding the structure from the Bridge project,” says the mayor of Villa San Giovanni.

Caminiti poses a question: “There is still no project for the construction site of the work, with expropriations we are still at year zero, since if there is no declaration of public utility, we cannot legally proceed.” The mayor, moreover, relaunches on the issue of the beginning of the work: “It will not happen before next fall since the Cipess will still have to pronounce itself and, moreover, they will have to listen to our observations and clarifications on the work and we are still waiting for the environmental impact assessment.”

There has been talk about the Bridge for decades now, but who knows what the King of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies would have said about a connection between Calabria and Trinacria.

Sicily, Strait Bridge work could cause Joachim Murat's fort to collapse

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