The track paver appears: the first kilometres on the open track and the start of equipping the railway technology
60 kilometres of double track, 11 tunnels, €243 million invested and the general contractor agreement from the implementation planning and the execution of the track and the railway technology to participation in the commissioning: the major new Wendlingen-Ulm line project continues.
Following the award of the contract for the entire railway engineering extension for two lots of the Stuttgart-Ulm railway project to the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Bahntechnik Schwäbische Alb (ARGE BSA), the work is progressing well: in May 2020, the first 33 kilometres were handed over to the ARGE partners Rhomberg Bahntechnik GmbH and Swietelsky Baugesellschaft m.b.H. Track construction is in full swing: the slab track in both bores of the approximately six-kilometre long Albabstieg Tunnel has been fully installed and construction of the track on the open track has also been underway since August 2019. Due to the effects of the weather, extended measures are required here to protect the track, which has been installed with millimetre precision, before and during concreting. An exciting challenge for the team, but one that was mastered brilliantly after the first control measurements.
A start has also been made in the rail technology: in the Albabstieg Tunnel, for example, a total of around 220 kilometres of cable have been laid in several construction phases since mid-April 2020 to supply all components of the electrotechnical and electromechanical equipment as well as the telecommunications and railway energy systems with power and data connections.
Probably one of the most decisive challenges for the whole ARGE BSA team arrives with the handover of the second half of the GU 3 construction section, which will take place shortly. As a result, some of the tunnels, which are up to 8.8 kilometres long, can only be built in dead ends. This requires a sophisticated rescue and logistics concept, which will challenge all those involved, especially with the large number of parallel operations.
