Grand Canal structure 'may have to be watched' - A slight movement in Venice's first new bridge in 70 years is worrying engineers carrying out the final tests on the controversial structure.
''It budged about a centimetre in a load-bearing trial,'' said project chief Roberto Casarin.
''Since it has a lifetime maximum shift tolerance of 4cm, I guess it'll have to be closely watched for the whole of its life span,'' Casarin.
The movement glitch is the latest hurdle to hit the bridge, which was installed two years late last summer after last-minute fears the canal banks wouldn't be able to hold it up properly. The flagship project has yet to be officially unveiled. Once up and running, the bridge will link Venice's railway station with Piazzale Roma, a car and bus terminal on the opposite side of the Grand Canal.
Designed by acclaimed Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, the bridge will be the fourth over the lagoon city's Grand Canal.
A sleek arc of steel accessed by a flight of glass steps, the bridge will span 94 metres from one bank to the other.
The project has been dogged by controversy and delays, with problems ranging from spiralling costs and alarm over the bridge's weight to protests over lack of access for the disabled.
An original price tag of four million euros has swelled to 11 million euros, while the decision to add an automatic elevator for wheelchairs has bumped the cost up a further 1.44 million euros.
A number of other alterations to the original design have helped up the price and delayed the planned inauguration date of June 2005.
These include the decision to add stairs, in order to make the structure more visible to tourists, and to use two kinds of stone instead of one.
Opponents of the bridge have said the money would have been better spent on the renovation of municipal buildings to help poorer families and encourage them to remain in the tourist-besieged city.
Calatrava, who also designed the 2004 Athens Olympic stadium, recently issued an angry statement rejecting the fears that the banks of the Grand Canal might not be able to bear the bridge's weight.
He said the weight of the bridge would be borne by foundations set into solid terrain, far below the banks, in a resilient layer of stone and earth compacted and hardened by hydraulic cylinders.
The architect, whose other trademark buildings include an auditorium and sealife centre in his native Valencia and the Milwaukee Museum of Fine Arts, also stressed the project delays and rising costs had nothing to do with him.
