By rosebell
With the aim of digging eight tunnels on Lot 1A of the railway in southern Italy, TBMs Leucosia, Ligea and Mireille have joined TBM Partenope and so all four TBMs for the Battipaglia–Romagnano section of the Salerno-Reggio Calabria high-speed/high-capacity railway have now been commissioned.
Linking Battipaglia to Romagnano, construction of this section is up to the Webuild-led Consorzio Xenia.
Being operated by Webuild in Europe, Leucosia and Ligea are, together with Partenope are the three largest TBMs with cutterheads of more than 13m diameter.
While TBM Partenope is boring the Saginara tunnel, excavation of the 800m-long Serra Lunga was up to TBM Leucosia and it is then due to move to the Acerra and Petrolla tunnels, separated by line viaducts. Also TBM Ligea is going to dig the 2.2km-long Piano Grasso tunnel, and later the Contursi tunnel.
As the first TBM to be refurbished at Webuild’s Terni factory, a new facility dedicated to TBM refurbishment,TBM Mireille that was refurbished after working on the Grand Paris Express is excavating the more than 1km-long Caterina tunnel and it is slated to move on to the Sicignano tunnel following excavation and lining of the Caterina tunnel are complete.
While the scheduled date for commencing excavation process of the Cerreta natural tunnel using the traditional method is the coming weeks, construction is under way on viaducts, including the route’s longest, which will cross the A2 Salerno–Reggio Calabria motorway. It will feature more than 100 spans, including a 120m-long railway arch bridge – the longest of its kind in Italy.
Including building 35km of high-speed railway between Battipaglia and Romagnano, including 20 tunnels and 19 viaducts, Lot 1A covers the province of Salerno.
Additionally, Webuild recently won the 22km Cosenza–Paola/San Lucido section, which includes the 15km-long Santomarco tunnel.
