Italy Allocates €10 Billion for Urgent Adige-Garda Tunnel Maintenance Project

The first ten billion euros are allocated for a major maintenance intervention on the Adige-Garda tunnel. It is the Ministry of Public Works that is funding the project, and within a few weeks, an additional four billion euros will be allocated. The provincial environmental assessor, Iva Berasi, expressed satisfaction: “A choice in favor of the environment and safety, also considering Lake Loppio. Just a few months after those November days, it was precisely the use of the tunnel, after 17 years of inactivity, that allowed us to cope with the exceptional flood of the Adige River.”

Interventions and considerations

“Certainly,” highlights the assessor, “the decision by the Ministry was influenced by the fact that the Province and the Basin Authority had submitted a detailed preliminary project. The unity of purpose among the Province, the Basin Authority, Trentino parliamentarians, and the local administrations around Lake Loppio (Mori and Nago-Torbole) was also decisive.”

An essential intervention not only for safety but especially for the Verona area.

The restoration of the tunnel (9.8 kilometers long with a diameter of over five meters) is accompanied, in fact, by an effort to recover Lake Loppio. The first phase of work, as outlined in the project, prioritizes filling the voids that have formed between the excavated rock and the lining. It is within these voids that water seeps in.

It should be noted that the construction of the tunnel began in the 1930s and was completed in 1959. During the management by the State, the tunnel was used nine times (up to 1983). Since January 2000, after returning to the spotlight last November, it has been managed by the Provincia di Trento.

In the coming weeks, a team of technicians will determine the methods and timing of the intervention. Two impermeable diaphragms will be created to delimit the intervention zone. Additionally, some concrete detachments will need to be addressed.