In people's perception, Asia, Europe and Africa seem to be regarded as distant geographical regions.
For those of us in East Asia, the distance from either Europe or Africa is more than tens of thousands of kilometers.
In Western Asia, however, the three continents were actually integrated and even ruled by the same civilization for a long time.
The Ottoman Empire, the Arab Empire, the Roman Empire and other great empires across Europe, Asia and Africa, and even the entire Mediterranean Sea were included.
As a result, the Mediterranean Sea became a transportation channel within the empire, and European troops or merchants needed only to cross the calm Mediterranean Sea to reach Africa on the other side.
However, if you choose to travel by land, you will face difficulties.
The presence of the Turkish Straits meant that they would have had to cross the Alps and Carpathian Mountains, cross Ukraine, the Caucasus Mountains, the Arabian Peninsula, and finally the Sinai Peninsula to reach Africa.
Even with the bridge now built across the Turkish Strait, there is still a long way to go through Turkey, especially for Portugal and Spain at the western end of Europe, and the overland route to Africa is a difficult task.
However, the map shows that at the western end of the Mediterranean Sea, there is a Strait of Gibraltar, which is only 14 kilometers at its narrowest point, and can be seen by the naked eye even on a clear day.
If a bridge were built in this place, wouldn't the land route between Europe and Africa be open?
However, it is strange that despite such advanced infrastructure technology today, the bridge between Spain and Africa has always been "difficult to produce", which is why?
Some people may think that Spain did not intend to build Bridges and tunnels in the first place, and the word "difficult birth" is not appropriate, but this is not the case.
Because as early as the 1930s, Spain had a clear plan to build a sea channel to connect Europe and Africa, but although it has been nearly a hundred years, this "fetus" has still not been born.
On February 5, 2022, Spain announced at the 12th Moses High-level Conference that it would speed up the study of the Gibraltar Channel Tunnel project, again saying that the future can be expected.
However, it is not easy to build such a bridge.
Each of the three major problems facing Spain is hellish and almost impossible to solve on its own.
First, there are the tangled territorial disputes.
The area has long been the focus of competition between European and African powers, making territorial claims near the Strait of Gibraltar very complicated.
This intricate territorial dispute has made the construction of the cross-sea bridge enter a delicate state of "three monks have no water to drink".
Secondly, the construction cost of the bridge.
The Strait of Gibraltar has a very complex hydrological environment and steep terrain, which is a great challenge for the construction of a bridge across the sea.
The construction cost of the tunnel is even more staggering, requiring tens of billions of euros of investment.
Finally, there is the question of profitability. Building an ultra-long tunnel is a huge investment, but how to make it profitable is a problem.
The experience of many similar projects has shown that even if passenger traffic increases after completion, it is difficult to achieve a return.
Therefore, although the Spanish Government has expressed its willingness to accelerate the study of the Gibraltar Channel Tunnel project, there are still many challenges to its eventual completion.
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