Colico, Forte Montecchio Lusardi

In 1912, before the Grande Guerra (The Great War), the High Com¬mander of the Italian Royal Army, initiated the building of another fortress on the Montecchio hill, along the short piece of coast between Colico and the mouth of River Adda. The fortress was completed at the end of 1914 and represents the most technological Italian in¬novation of World War One. Its main function was to check the streets to Spluga, Maloja and Stelvio. The fortress was actually used neither in the first nor in the Second World War. Only once a few gunshots were shot to a column of German soldiers on the opposite side of the Lake. Later the fortress was used as a munition depot and finally it became a public property. The Montecchio Fortress, an exceptional example of military architecture of the twentieth century, is the only intact fortress in Italy. The original equipment are perfectly preserved and functioning: the electrical system, the interphone and the lifts. The four cannons, 149/35 Schneider, are in four cupolas that can rotate 360 degrees and have an elevating arc from -8 to +42 degrees. The fortress has an reinforced concrete and stones structure.