Connecting Sicily with Italy - World's largest suspension bridge to be finished until 2016

Construction of the world's largest suspension bridge, which will connect Sicily and Italy, is scheduled to begin at the end of December 2011 and is expected to be completed by 2016. The bridge will be 4.83 kilometers long and 60 meters wide, and it will have enough room for 12 traffic lanes in addition to two center lanes for passenger trains. It will cost approximately 3.88 billion euros ($5.17 billion USD) to construct the bridge.

The main piers will be constructed 122 meters in water. The bridge is designed to withstand winds of up to 134 miles per hour and earthquakes that measure up to 7.1 on the Richter scale.

Once built, it will accommodate more than 100,000 vehicles and 200 trains a day.

For hundreds of years residents of mainland Italy and the island of Sicily have discussed the idea of a bridge that would connect the two bodies of land by spanning the Strait of Messina. However, because of the two-mile width of the strait, its depth, its current, and the fact that it frequently experiences tremors and earthquakes, a bridge seemed to be out of the question. Because of these issues, a ferry system was developed and used instead.