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World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

bbc.com

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Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#71

Post by sanoli »

elcapitan wrote: post #29
wolfgke wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Once the new Berlin airport is finished in about 5-10 years, I'll fly down there to celebrate. Rather if the new Berlin airport is ever finished... In other words: If you want to celebrate, rather fly down to Berlin now and celebrate the opening of the Gotthard tunnel in Berlin .

I know, I live there ;)

To all you western europeans complaining: come down to Brazil, and I'll take you on a tour of our "Top Ten Most Abandoned-Halfway Billion Dollar Government Works" ;-)

Oh, and just to give an example, the construction of one of our nuclear power plants began in 1984 but was halted in 1986, only to begin where it left off in 2010, to be finished in 2015. Wait, now it is in 2016. Nope, just checked, it should be in 2018. All the while, the cost to maintain the stuff that was already bought or built is around 20 million a year, since 1986. So yeah, this one is on our TOP TEN list. This little swiss tunnel is not.

Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#72

Post by andy_ppp »

It seems as if Europe has most of the worlds great infrastructure projects going on right now, with this and Cross Rail. Is there anything of similar scale going on in the US, China or India?

EDIT: Answering my own question...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_transport_megaprojects

and

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_megaprojects

Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#73

Post by Annatar »

elcapitan wrote: post #49
lgieron wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And, more often than not, these requirement changes are used as excuses for extending the deadline so that project ends up being done "on time". I've worked in management on multi-year waterfall projects and this is how this game is played.

It would be fun to see an "agile" tunnel project. "This rock is too solid to drill through with our machines!" – "Ok, for now let's just drill around it and make it an underground rollercoaster instead of a railway, we can get back to the original design later!"

Not in this case, as the train is specified to go at 250 km/h, which means that the tunnel had to be pretty straight, or else the train might derail at that speed.

Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#74

Post by Piskvorrr »

tajen wrote: post #66
piquadrat wrote: post #17

There's a great 360° video on Youtube that shows both the tunnel as well as the Gotthard massif through which the tunnel leads. It's in German, but the visuals are impressive on their own. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDSCtXvL51o

OMG I just understood what you meant with 360! You can swipe to the direction you want, like in Quicktime VR, but animated! I didn't know Youtube made it possible! The video was just showing the rails, I thought it was boring until I understood the concept.

Yup, the default direction of the camera is somewhat unfortunate - and there's no hint of controlling it :(

Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#75

Post by j4_james »

jakub_g wrote: post #70
tajen wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OMG I just understood what you meant with 360! You can swipe to the direction you want, like in Quicktime VR, but animated! I didn't know Youtube made it possible! The video was just showing the rails, I thought it was boring until I understood the concept.

Thanks for the comment. BTW Make sure to open the video in Chrome or Opera, the 360 thing does not work in Firefox

FWIW, it works for me in Firefox on Windows 10. Click and drag with the mouse, clicking on the arrows, or swiping on a touchscreen all work fine.

Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#76

Post by abduhl »

sschueller wrote: post #7
tellarin wrote: post #3

"... longest and deepest rail tunnel ..." and "... delivered on time and within budget ..." Only in Switzerland, I guess. :) I wish there were better write ups of how the planning for this came together and what differs from other somewhat similar huge projects.

There is a bit on wikipedia[1] (more in the german version). The project wasn't with out Problems but because of such strict planning they could be solved. For example one of the TBM's got stuck for months, another issues such as sub contractors delivering fraudulent materials also had to be dealt with. [2] Although the Swiss part went well there are issues with the connection in Germany and Italy. Some projects in I…

I don't read German so maybe this is covered in your article but what does strict planning have to do with getting a TBM unstuck or fraudulent materials? Wouldn't these issues point towards a lack of planning/quality control?

Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#77

Post by tobltobs »

bjelkeman-again wrote: post #11
tellarin wrote: post #3

"... longest and deepest rail tunnel ..." and "... delivered on time and within budget ..." Only in Switzerland, I guess. :) I wish there were better write ups of how the planning for this came together and what differs from other somewhat similar huge projects.

A much shorter tunnel, but with two new underground train stations, is being built under Stockholm, Sweden.[1] It is about 1/6 of the Swiss budget (about $2 billion). It will be completed on budget and slightly ahead of time this year.[2] So it can be done. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_City_Line [2] in Swedish. http://framtidensinfrastruktur.se/artikel/snart-fardigbyggt-...

You can't compare those two projects.

Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#78

Post by abduhl »

Annatar wrote: post #68
tellarin wrote: post #3

"... longest and deepest rail tunnel ..." and "... delivered on time and within budget ..." Only in Switzerland, I guess. :) I wish there were better write ups of how the planning for this came together and what differs from other somewhat similar huge projects.

That is typical for Switzerland, and it is because for the Swiss, "planning is 50% of the work". They invest the time up-front in planning and thinking about how whatever it is they are doing is going to work, and once they either ran proof of concept tests or thought it through, they set the machinery in motion. There will even be a clearly documented process for modelling the process, and a process for getting the…

This is incredibly disrespectful to the professionals in other parts of the developed world who do infrastructure or construction related work. Every mega project (and most mid sized projects) invests significant money and time in planning and design and also has defined work flows/design processes.

I'd be interested to see any breakdown of costs or schedule that show "planning" as being 50% of the the work.

Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#79

Post by tobltobs »

ptaipale wrote: post #22
WalterBright wrote: post #5

This is $12.5b and 17 years for a 35 mile tunnel through solid rock. Seattle's transit plan is $50b, 25 years, and laying tracks on grade. Probably about the same number of miles. http://seattletransitblog.com/2016/03/24/st3-draft-plan-over...

However, building passenger transit in an urban area is a very different thing, even if a long underground tunnel is a challenge in itself. Mining through solid rock is not really that expensive these days. But when building metropolitan transit, arranging traffic around of an existing population is not easy, and building transit stations is an expensive business. Making a tunnel through solid, hard rock is in any ca…

> Mining through solid rock is not really that expensive these days.

If there would have been only solid rock the swiss would have build this tunnel centuries ago. There was a lot of slippery rock in between.

Re: World's longest and deepest rail tunnel to open in Switzerland

#80

Post by swombat »

abduhl wrote: post #78
Annatar wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is typical for Switzerland, and it is because for the Swiss, "planning is 50% of the work". They invest the time up-front in planning and thinking about how whatever it is they are doing is going to work, and once they either ran proof of concept tests or thought it through, they set the machinery in motion. There will even be a clearly documented process for modelling the process, and a process for getting the…

This is incredibly disrespectful to the professionals in other parts of the developed world who do infrastructure or construction related work. Every mega project (and most mid sized projects) invests significant money and time in planning and design and also has defined work flows/design processes. I'd be interested to see any breakdown of costs or schedule that show "planning" as being 50% of the the work.

It seems a bit harsh to me to call this "incredibly disrespectful". I doubt that "incredible disrespect" was intended, nor is it inherent to the statement.

What I think you mean is that the grandparent comment strikes you personally as not recognising the efforts of other engineers around the world, and you wish it did. I think that would be a less incendiary and aggressive way to get your point across, and, in most places, more likely to get a useful response.

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