People visiting Sicily from mainland Italy may no longer have to wait ages for a ferry if plans for a mega-bridge come to fruition – but that could be a very big ‘if’.

Ministers in the Italian government gave the green light yesterday to ambitious proposals for a road connection between Calabria and the Mediterranean island.

It’s the biggest step yet in a decades-long debate over the viability of the idea, which would require a record-breaking bridge costing billions.

The structure would need to span just over two miles across the Strait of Messina, becoming comfortably the longest suspension bridge in the world.

Currently, that record is held by the Canakkale Bridge in north-western Turkey, which is a mere 1.25 miles long.

But the scale of the project is not the only challenge facing

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