By Lynda Myer
For first time in the city’s history, following the first section of rail was installed in Cross River Rail’s twin tunnels, rail tracks are lying deep underneath Brisbane.
Commencing from just south of the future Albert Street station, the installation process is headed towards the Brisbane River and future Woolloongabba station.
While the current advancement rate of project is at around 50-100 meters per a day, the 40-strong track installation crew will fit out the project’s 5.9-kilometre twin tunnels with almost 25 kilometers of rail over the next 12 months, creating Brisbane’s first below-river rail crossing in the process.
In order to embedding into the underlying concrete slab, unlike surface tracks where rails are laid on top of sleepers and ballast (or rocks), rail in the tunnels is placed on concrete blocks.
While track installation is undergoing beneath the CBD, rail has also reached at the project’s northern tunnel entrance at Bowen Hills, with fit-out set to start there later in the year.
