It has been dreamt of since Roman times, and plans have repeatedly sketched out on the drawing board only to be torn up because of cost, bureaucratic obstacles and fears of earthquakes and Mafia involvement.

But today the new centre Right goverment of Silvio Berlusconi declared that an historic two-mile bridge from the mainland to Sicily over the Straits of Messina - the longest single span suspension bridge in the world - was an “urgent priority” and that work on it would start “soon”.

Altero Matteoli, the Infrastructure Minister, said he had asked Pietro Ciucci, head of the company in charge of the long-delayed project, “to create conditions for the resumption of the construction of the project as soon as possible”. During the election campaign last month Mr Berlusconi remarked that “building this bridge entirely with Italian hands is a matter of national pride”.

The contract for the bridge was awarded to the construction firm Impregilo three years ago by the last Berlusconi government. Impregilo formed the “Societa Stretto di Messina” under Mr Ciucci to build the bridge, with a target date for completion of 2012 and an estimated cost of nearly five billion euros.

It was among a number of infrastructure projects later shelved by the short-lived centre-Left government of Romano Prodi, who described it as “not a priority” and of “doubtful viability”.

However, Mr Berlusconi — widely criticised for his failure to revive the Italian economy when last in power from 2001 to 2006 — has moved fast on several fronts since he was sworn in two weeks ago. This week he issued a draconian decree to deal with street crime, illegal immigration and the Naples rubbish crisis, and vowed to overturn a 20-year moratorium and reintroduce nuclear power plants in Italy.

The Messina Straits plan envisages a suspension bridge with six traffic lanes and two railway lines, with a span of 3,300 metres, longer than the 1,991-metre Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge in Japan, supported by steel cables. The towers at either end would be 382 metres high.

The bridge is intended to link Reggio Calabria on the mainland to Messina, a stretch of water of 16 kilometres (10 miles) at its widest point and connected only by ferries since ancient times, when its treacherous eddies and whirlpools gave rise to the myth of the monsters Scylla and Charybdis described in Homer’s Odyssey.

Opposition leaders said the bridge was in an earthquake zone, and there were “well-founded fears” that the funds would be diverted to organised crime, which controls much of the construction industry in southern Italy. Luigi Croce, chief prosecutor in Messina, said he feared the Mafia would end up controlling “everything from local road work to the catering contracts”.

Environmentalists object that the bridge will destroy the delicate ecosystem of the Straits, threatening rare species of animals and plants and disrupting bird migrations.

According to the Greek historian Strabo, Roman troops returning from the Punic wars with Carthage lashed together boats across the Straits to transport elephants captured after battle with Hannibal, but they were swept away by the currents.

The idea of a bridge across the Straits was mooted by Charlemagne and then by the Norman rulers of Sicily in the Middle Ages. Detailed plans were drawn up by 19th-century engineers after Italian unification, but never implemented.

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