Videoscript Life Unit 5f, Appunti di Lingua Inglese

Unit 5f – Scandinavian mega-bridge

Part 1

What’s it takes to build one of the world’s mega bridges?

In northern Europe, the Baltic Sea converges with the North Sea at the Øresund Strait. It’s ten miles wide

with lousy weather. And it’s done a great job of keeping Denmark separate from Sweden.

The Øresund Strait is a frustrating barrier because each shore has something the other needs. Copenhagen,

Denmark, needs cheaper housing. Malmö, Sweden, needs more jobs. Connect the dots and you could unleash

an economic powerhouse. A bridge would make them one big metropolis, but it’s never been possible. Until

now.

challenge: figuring out how to build a bridge ten miles long. Immediately, they face a dangerous setback. On

the Denmark side, right at the shoreline, is the Copenhagen international airport, Kastrup. Computer

simulations show that building a bridge with high towers would obstruct air traffic … or worse. A low bridge

would be safer for air traffic, but it would block Denmark’s ship traffic.

When engineers can’t build over the water, they consider building under it, with a tunnel ten miles long.

Peter Lundhus That would be the beautiful solution, building a tunnel from one side to the other, but that

would be the expensive solution. So the third solution that we decided was, of course, to build part-bridge

and then a tunnel where we were getting close to the airport. A bridge would have been easier or cheaper, but

would not have been a good idea for the aeroplanes.

Somewhere, they need dry land for the tunnel to emerge from under water. They need an island, so they’ll