Down here near Nice, you find most locals unsurprised by the catastrophic Genoa bridge collapse. The Italian border is only a few miles away but most people will find any excuse not to cross it — including my wife and me. In fact, these days we don’t go there at all. We haven’t done for years. Friends find this strange. After all, Italy’s closeness is one of the reasons we bought the place. So why do I fight shy of motoring through the long autostrada tunnel that runs under the pre-Alps, linking Menton to Ventimiglia? Because it’s bloody dangerous. Not on the scrupulously maintained French side, brightly lit with clearly marked carriageways. But the moment you flash over the border into subterranean Italy, everything goes pear-shaped. At least I think it’s pear-shaped; it’s so dark it’s hard to tell. Cat’s-eye road studs vanish for hundreds of yards. The Italian authorities don’t seem to have any programme of replacing blown bulbs and gouged-out reflectors. The result is a journey through a darkness relieved only by the dazzle of approaching lorry headlights ruthlessly switched to full beam.
Collisions in tunnels are the worst kind — confined space, darkness, lack of access — yet the Italians have for years allowed their vital link between the Côte d’Azur and Amalfi coast to deteriorate into deadly darkness. Three years ago, after a hair-raising near-miss with a heavy lorry in the Stygian gloom, I vowed never to drive into Italy again. Italian engineers now say the Genoa bridge collapse may be the harbinger of dozens more across the country, thanks to a corrupt municipal menu of slapdash building, mafia involvement and lousy maintenance. Driving through the Menton-Ventimiglia tunnel is your delightful antipasto to all that.
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