I Mille del Ponte: A thousand professions for a great infrastructure project

04 August 2020

When Italians think of Genoa, they always associate the city with Garibaldi and the Expedition of the Thousand. But in this case, the thousand heroes are not setting off from Quarto to unify Italy. These thousand heroes work in the Polcevera Valley, over the river where the new bridge built in less than two years was inaugurated on August 3, a work of great architectural and technological importance. 

Out of a great tragedy, this can be viewed as an Italian success story which Fondazione Ansaldo celebrates by producing a photo book entitled “I Mille del Ponte”, presented on 31 July in the church of San Marco al Molo, house of “Cappellani del Lavoro” in Genoa with speeches by Monsignor Molinari, Fondazione Ansaldo President Raffaella Luglini, Major and Deputy Mayor of Genoa Marco Bucci and Stefano Balleari, and Massimiliano Lussana, editor of the publication.



“I Mille del Ponte” is the story of the thousand women and men who made the construction of the new bridge possible at various stages in the project: the demolition of the remaining sections of the old bridge; the controlled explosion of the pylons that had not collapsed; the voyages of the barges bringing the new bridge components from Castellamare di Stabia; construction of the concrete piers; raising the parts of the bridge deck; the paving and the finishing work.


The publication is dedicated to the city of Genoa, a homage to all the people who worked on the construction of the new bridge. Fondazione Ansaldo, whose archives contain important testimony of the project, sees “I Mille del Ponte” as representing the epitome of its mission of acting as a bridge. A bridge between two worlds: culture and enterprise. A bridge between the past, with so many experiences to talk about, and the future, to be planned and built on the basis of the teachings of those who went before us. A bridge between the value of work and the value of enterprise. All pillars that Fondazione Ansaldo has been promoting out of Genoa for the past 40 years.

 

 

Photo credit: “I Mille del Ponte”, Fondazione Ansaldo editore, Massimiliano Lussana, Genova 2020