Third pass is made: another about-face by Toninelli and Cinque Stelle

After the Tap – and waiting for the Tav – the 5 Star Movement backtracks on another of the great works. The Minister of Infrastructure, Danilo Toninelli, announced in a very long post on Facebook that "the Third Pass can only go on", because the "exit" costs, including expenses already incurred, penalties to be paid to businesses and site restoration , amount to 2,7 billion euros (1,2 of previous expenses and 1,5 of penalties), while the cost-benefit analysis gives a negative result, but of "only" 1,576 billion euros. Consequently, reversing would cost more than the negative balance when fully operational, without having the new freight railway line between Genoa and Northern Italy (Milan, Turin, Swiss border crossings). However, Toninelli explains that the project must improve, to connect the new line to the port of Genoa and "make the rear port junction of Alessandria fully operational".

The cost-benefit analysis - explains Toninelli in the post - together with the "connected legal analysis will soon be published in full, it tells us this: the cost of the final work, discounted to 30 years, would exceed the benefits by a figure of 1 billion and 576 million. Within this billion and a half there are various items, for example the lower revenues of motorway concessionaires or 905 million euros of excise taxes on petrol which would not be collected by the State due to the modal change from road to rail”.

Then “there is the legal aspect – explains the Minister – and the analysis carried out makes a forecast on the costs of abandoning the work. At least one tenth of the residual value of the contract must be added to the billion and a half already spent, for works already carried out, which is not contemplated in the legal analysis, but which at that point would be spent for nothing: we are therefore talking about 463 million to be compensated standing general contractor".

Furthermore, "there are the works that the general contractor entrusts to third parties, given that he only carries out the work on his own for 40%: here the costs, damages and lost profits to be paid could amount to a sum exceeding one tenth and would fall on the Italian railway network, therefore ultimately on the State".

Therefore, “we are talking about at least another half billion. Remaining cautious, we are already faced with 1 billion in estimated costs deriving from a possible unilateral contractual withdrawal, to which approximately 200 million must be added for the restoration of the sites. Therefore, the total costs of the withdrawal would amount to about 1 billion and 200 million euros of public money". Consequently, the Third Pass cannot be blocked.

"But making it go ahead - concludes Tonintelli - does not mean completing it as it is, but making the work efficient with respect to its goals". Toninelli then explains that the new railway line “must be really well connected with Genoa: therefore, the tracks must reach right into the port. It is also necessary to make the rear port junction of Alessandria fully operational, which moreover insists on an area owned by RFI and Mercitalia. Alessandria must and will be the natural hinterland of Genoa because it has all the characteristics to become one”.