The legal battle against the bridge over the Strait of Messina is enriched with a new chapter, this time at European level. Greenpeace, Legambiente, Lipu and WWF presented an supplementary complaint to the European Commission on 4 August, claiming that the authorization process of the work is clearly violated the community directives to protect the environment. The first complaint had already been sent on March 27 last.

The heart of the dispute lies in the procedure itself with which you are trying to approve the project. The environmental impact of the bridge, once denied, is today an acclaimed and even admitted fact by its proposers. This impact is so significant that it has requested the activation of a special procedure, the so -called “level III of the Vinca” (Evaluation of incidence), foreseen when a project affects protected areas of the Natura 2000 network, as are the two banks of the Strait and the arm of the sea that divides them.

This procedure in derogation, prescribed by the same via-vas commission (environmental impact assessment), allows you to carry out a work despite the negative impacts, but only in three iron and non-negotiable conditions, established by the “habitat” and “birds” directives:

“Paradoxical” motivations to avoid the EU opinion

The complaint focuses the finger at the “imperative reasons” given by the government, defined instrumental to evade the opinion of the European Commission. These include military, health and civil protection reasons. The associations reject them as “paradoxical”. A bridge, they claim, would be a primary strategic objective in the event of conflict, and today thinking about shifts of troops by land on rubber appears anachronistic.

The health motivations, which hypothesize an improvement in services and a reduction in hospital overload thanks to the bridge, are defined as “unlikely”, since the problems of local health systems are linked to deficiencies of resources and means, certainly not the difficulty of crossing the Strait. Similarly, the reasons for civil protection would ignore the emergency management dynamics, such as the National Canadair system, and the probable collapse of mobility in the event of a seismic event. The via-vas commission, for its part, took note of these reasons without entering the merits, considering them of government competence.

Alternatives never evaluated and insufficient compensations

Another critical point raised in the complaint is the failure to analyze alternatives. According to environmentalists, the via-vas commission would have ratified with a “notarial approach” the unique span solution, chosen by Parliament with an ad hoc law in 2023. This without conducting an objective and third evaluation, as required by EU regulations when certain environmental impacts are involved. It is also underlined that the conclusions of the Technical Working Group appointed by the Draghi government in 2021, which indicated different solutions, were completely ignored.

Finally, the compensation measures proposed are judged “severely insufficient”. The analyzes would be based on obsolete data, such as those on the migratory vipifauna dating back to 2011, and would underestimate the loss of habitats and the cumulative effects of all the works connected to the bridge.

In support of this thesis, the complaint cites an opinion of the Higher Institute for Environmental Protection and Research (ISPRA), acquired by the same Via-Vas Commission but, according to the associations, not duly considered. The ISPRA had declared: “The direct and indirect impact caused by the connection between the two sides and by all the infrastructures connected to it including the enormous shipbuilding activity for some taxa (i.e. some categories of species) in a state of unfavorable conservation or risk of extinction is not mitigable nor acquisor”.

For all these reasons, Greenpeace, Legambiente, Lipu and WWF believe that Italy is violating the directives 92/43/EEC “habitat” and 2009/147/EC “birds”, and formally ask Bruxelles to start an infringement procedure.

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