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Comment by zoklet-enjoyer | Hacker News Reader

I saw a video about how crazy of an engineering challenge this will be. I guess the pricetag is evidence of that. I hope it pays off for them.

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It won't pay off. It is a gift to mafia.

WeBuilt, the general contractor, is one of the biggest building companies in the world. They even built a part of Panama Channel expansion. Why do you think that they are mafiosi? Personally I don't know if this bridge would be useful or not, but I think that refuse to building it just because mafia risk it's a stupid reason. Italy has a strong law and control system to prevent that and I remembered exactly the same argument about Bologna-Firenze high speed train tunnel and highways that after almost 20 years are successful infrastructures.

The problem is not WeBuilt, issues usually arise with subcontracting.

Calabria is home of Ndrangheta https://www.interpol.int/en/Crimes/Organized-crime/Projects/...

Ndrangheta is a huge criminal organization with ties to politics and a lot of economic power and it is based in Calabria.

The current government actively proposed special antimafia rules for checking contractors and subcontractors for the bridge which, IMHO, reinforce the idea that it is a gift to mafia. Luckily the proposal was rejected by the president https://en.ilsole24ore.com/art/strait-bridge-no-derogation-a...

We already had issues with ndrangheta and infrastructures for example https://transparency.eu/the-eternally-unfinished-highway/ or https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gioia_Tauro

All of this only on one side of the bridge, on the other you have Sicily.

I think that there are reasonable doubts about mafia interference with the construction of the bridge.

Also this is relevant to understand the situation in Calabria if you can read Italian or maybe with some translation tool https://www.ilpost.it/2025/06/27/commissariamenti-calabria/

Then we should not do anything in Calabria and Sicilia for the fear of the criminal organisations?

There are many suspects that criminal organisations are involved in the actual ferry management:

https://lespresso.it/c/attualita/2021/2/23/cosi-la-mafia-con...

Whit your mindset we need to stop them as well

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