Stuttgart 21: Excavation of Feuerbach Tunnel Is Finished
Driving for the Feuerbach Tunnel, which connects the existing railway lines to and from Mannheim, Karlsruhe and Paris with the future Stuttgart Central Station, was completed with a tunnel breakthrough on June 5, 2020 after a construction period of around five and a half years. The breakthrough took place at a depth of around 15 m shortly before Feuerbach station.
A joint venture consisting of the companies Baresel GmbH, Alfred Kunz and Walo Bertschinger AG from Switzerland had been commissioned with the construction of the tunnel in 2012; driving for the Feuerbach tunnel started on 10 December 2014 from the intermediate heading Prag. From this access tunnel, the two single-track bores were driven in the direction of both the main railway station and Feuerbach using the conventional excavation method. From the opposite direction from Feuerbach station, the double-track section of the tunnel was built in parallel. For this purpose, the existing tracks at Feuerbach station had to be moved four times during ongoing operations.
The Feuerbach Tunnel is 3026 m long and runs for the most part in two single-track bores connected by cross passages. In the single-track bores, the tunnel has a diameter of around 10 m. The tunnel has the largest diameter of around 22 m in the area of the double-track section between the future central station and the branching structure at Kriegsberg. There the Cannstatt tunnel branches off the Feuerbach tunnel. In the now completed construction section at Feuerbach station, the tunnel also runs in a double-track bore.
