If anything, a tunnel would be ‘safer’ and certainly more robust than a bridge.

Gozo’s charm has already been lost due to these EU-funded highways cutting through the island, and now some fools want a tunnel or bridge.

Why don’t you all pool in together and fund it as a business, with a toll-paying system? Just please don’t touch the money I pay in taxes to the government.

I pay more taxes than Jesmond Mugliett’s annual declared income, plus my income is derived from honest work.

Bridges can be beautiful.

Nobody with any sense has ever criticised the Forth Bridge as an eyesore have they?

In fact, it is celebrated as a gem.

Now that you mention walkways, Tokyo’s experimenting with a high speed tapis roulant, the trick was to get variable velocities, slow at entry points, faster along the route and slow again on exit, The geometry resembles that of a luggage retriever.

Imagine what happens to the property market and how the value of a particular street can be engineered if it’s close to an entrance.

It’s like installing a lift in an old apartment block.

Jozef, I agree. Because of major third party interests, it will require considerable political will to make “an alternative use” underground network a reality.

The same engineer which showed me the study mentioned in my previous post, suggested that with modern moving walkways one could potentially cover the distance from B’Kara terminal to Valletta in about 30 minutes. If that is achievable than I think it would be extraordinary. If one could add pedal cycle lanes the better.

Such non mechanised walkways could also generate considerable financial sources to cover fixed and recurrent expenditure.

Issa qed thallat haga m’ohra TROY.

The only way for the bridge to be feasible would be to section it into two with a land artery bisecting Comino right on top of the lagoon.

Not a good idea.

I wouldn’t make comparisons without taking into account the fact that Malta is an island state. Think of the capital we use to import cars, and how a part can be retrieved if employed to add this infrastructure.

It becomes imperative to involve car importers to participate in the business model. At the moment, they aren’t even interested in selling motorbikes, even because the tax brackets are ridiculous.

The metro doesn’t have to be the traditional model, a very interesting system is that developed in Bogota’ which is a mix of underground and dedicated surface routes used by buses. As you rightly called it, an underground network can have different functions, it creates space and instantaneous access.

The proposed tunnel will require much longer entrance and exit approaches and nobody seems to be that excited.

If a tunnel is ever built, the idea of an Eco-Gozo might as well be put to rest.

And there is no light at the end of that tunnel as yet.