SICt Workshop - Sicurezza delle Infrastrutture Critiche transfrontaliere

On April 1st 2019 at Palazzo Lombardia was held the first Workshop of the SICt (Sicurezza delle Infrastrutture Critiche transfrontaliere – Security of cross-border critical infrastructures) project, financed under the Italy-Switzerland Interreg cooperation programme. The geographical area of interest of the project stretches from Zurich to Milan, affecting almost 400 road and rail transportation nodes. The workshop involved more than 50 stakeholders, including the CI operators from both countries, such as Autostrade per l’Italia, Autostrada Pedemontana Lombarda, Ferrovie Nord, RFI, SBB CFF FFS, E-distribuzione, Terna, Snam.

The project aims to strengthen the joint risk management capacities linked to events that may partially or totally disrupt the continuity of critical transport infrastructures service with cross-border relevance. It will be achieved by advancing the sharing of knowledge and information on cross-border Critical Infrastructures through the implementation of joint monitoring systems and communication procedures between Lombardy (Italy) and Ticino (Switzerland). The action strategy of the project is to improve the effectiveness of a shared prevention system built to reduce the impact of potential disruptive events involving the cross-border area between the province of Como-Lecco-Varese and the southern side of Canton Ticino.

The instruments and the strategies used by the two states currently differ in terms of the interface. The communication and the design of shared and coordinated preventive measures is therefore not sufficiently immediate and effective. To address this issue the SICt project targets a substantial investment in advanced technological infrastructures for monitoring the threats and for the exchange of information during the emergency event.

The School of Management (SOM) of Politecnico di Milano is the scientific partner. Other partners of the project are: Lombardy Region (the consortium leader), Repubblica e Cantone Ticino - Dipartimento del territorio, Politecnico di Milano - Mobility and Transport Laboratory and Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana (SUPSI).

The R2MACS research group is responsible for modelling and analyzing the interdependences between the infrastructures and for mapping the resilience capacity inside the ecosystem of the actors involved. For each of the hazards and threats present, different levels of vulnerability will be defined through static and dynamic parameters that are descriptive of the characteristics of each CI node. Moreover, interdependency analysis will be conducted among the CI nodes identified using the DMCI simulation tool developed by POLIMI and available on the GRRASP online platform of the JRC (Joint Research Centre di Ispra).

The project started in December 2018 and will be completed by the end of 2021.