I don't understand how the company running to roads / tolls made 4 billion profit, seems a tad extreme given its a monopoly, sounds like everyone was on the take.

That's the whole point of privatization: socialize the losses and privatize the profits while getting rid of highly paid people you couldn't fire otherwise.



If the state could make a profit doing it right, it wouldn't have gotten privatized.

Are you referring to the linked BBC article? The chart shows countrywide investments, not profits. If not, where do you get that number from?

According to a meeting protocol reported on by L'Espresso, the poor state of the Morandi bridge has been known at least since February.

A meeting has taken place February 1, 2018, with the Italian ministry on infrastructure in Rome, the regional ministry in Liguria, and representatives of Autostrade per L'Italia present, plus 7 experts. The topic was the state of the bridge, and planning service works. Everybody present had been informed that the steel ropes' diameter for pilons 9 and 10 had been reduced by up to 10-20% by corrosion, and that their anchoring(?) in the concrete was insufficient.

Despite these deficiencies no action was taken. No reduction of traffic, no limit on the weight per vehicle, no reduction of amount of vehicles, let alone a repair of the above mentioned deficiencies.

Now, from what I understand, Roberto Ferrazza is the head of the national ministry that supervises the roads and their maintenance. He was presiding that meeting, the protocol bears his signature.

Drumrolls please ....

The very same Ferrazza is to head the committee that inspects the collapse and is to determine its cause(s).

Sometimes reality is stranger than fiction.

Various articles in Italian:

"I numeri di Autostrade per l'Italia: 2,52 miliardi di manutenzioni. Dal 2013 realizzati 4 miliardi di utili"

(2.52 billion spent on maintenance, 4 billion in profit since 2013)

https://www.repubblica.it/economia/2...tia-204250797/

Tom

The remaining bridge towers have now been demolished

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-eu...ers-demolished

Another bridge has collapsed. Luckily, thanks to the coronavirus situation, only a couple of vehicles were on what is normally a busy road.

"Two van drivers escaped serious injury when a bridge over a river in northern Italy collapsed on Wednesday.

The provincial road would normally have been busy but there was little traffic when the bridge fell, because of coronavirus lockdown measures.

Images from the scene show a red courier vehicle apparently still upright on the collapsed road.

The driver was hit by falling masonry and airlifted to hospital, but his injuries were described as minor.

The driver of a second van was able to clamber out of his vehicle unscathed but suffering from shock, reports said. Firefighters were checking the river in case anyone else was involved."

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52213898

OMG - we take that bridge every year- so so scary. We used to take the one in Genoa regulalry too .. and some of the ones we use to go to Southern Tuscany are so so high and long.

A very large percentage of bridges in most parts of Europe are likely facing the same fate.


Italy is maybe just the country where they are in the most severe state of neglect. But it could also happen in Germany.