Construction boom of 1960s led to mafia involvement and use of cheap materials to boost profits
The collapse of a bridge in Genoa on Tuesday, which killed 39 people, is the latest symptom of Italy’s infrastructure woes. More than 2m homes across the country are unstable, according to figures from the national statistics agency, Istat, and more than 156 school ceilings have fallen in over the last five years. The Morandi Bridge, considered an engineering jewel when it was inaugurated in 1967, was the 12th bridge to have collapsed in Italy since 2004. Five of those were in the last five years. Many of the problems can be traced back to the construction boom of the 1960s, when bridges, roads, buildings and schools were being built, often with weak or cheap material to increase profits, and ending up in the hands of the mafia. [Read more]. |
- Lorenzo Tondo, Italy’s crumbling infrastructure under scrutiny after bridge collapse, The Guardian, August 17, 2018
The buildings beneath the collapsed Morandi Bridge. Photo: Laura Lezza/Getty Images.
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