Webuild has completed the excavation of the 2 km Grottaminarda tunnel on the high-speed, high-capacity Naples – Bari railway line after TBM Aurora crossed Southern Apennines. The TBM, which started the work in August 2023, is now prepared for the Melito tunnel on the Apice – Hirpinia rail section.
The completion of the tunnelling works for the Grottaminarda tunnel, on which Webuild has worked 24/7, is a significant leap forward for work advancement along the Naples-Bari route.
The TBM Aurora measures 100 metres in length, a cutting head with a diameter of approximately 12.5 metres and has 18 engines providing 6.3 MW of power. The TBM, along its journey, beside excavating the tunnel, also completed its lining with precast concrete segments. The TBM Aurora, with the completion of the Grottaminarda tunnel, will be transferred on the other side of the Ufita river, where it will begin excavating a second tunnel of Apice – Hirpinia rsection, the 4 km Melito tunnel. Excavation works have also started along the same section, on the third tunnel of the section, the 6.4 km Rocchetta tunnel.
The Grottaminarda tunnel is the first of the three tunnels foreseen on the Apice – Hirpinia section, on the central section of the Naples – Bari rail line. It foresees building over 18 km of railway line, of which 13 km, underground, in a vast territory between the provinces of Avellino and Benevento, along a complex route, from a geotechnical and geomorphological perspective.
The new 145 km high-speed, high-capacity Naples – Bari railway line is an integral part of the Scandinavian – Mediterranean core network corridor. Once completed, it will be a strategic mobility infrastructure for the whole of the South of Italy. It will significantly reduce distances between the Campania and Puglia regions, and the rest of central-northern Italy. It will also connect the rest of Italy on the Eastern-Western sides.
The entire project is expected to be completed in 2028 when the journey time between Naples and Bari will be reduced to 2 hours, from currently 4 hours.
According to Rete Ferroviaria Italiana (RFI), in 2025 it will be possible to travel directly between these two cities in just 2 hours and 40 minutes, without needing to change train. The new railway route will bring many benefits, also in environmental sustainability terms, allowing to avoid over 3 million tonnes of CO2 emissions during the 2023-2047 period.
Naples – Bari rail project is implemented into seven lots of which four are constructed by Webuild and include the Naples – Cancello, Apice – Hirpinia, Hirpinia – Orsara and Orsara – Bovino. Webuild will build over 74 km of new railway line, 6 tunnels, 10 viaducts and 6 between new stations and stops.
Besides the Apice – Hirpinia section, Webuild also continues the works on Orsara – Bovino, for which excavation works of the 10 km Orsara tunnel began in July. By the end of the year, mechanised excavation works of the odd-numbered barrel of the same tunnel will also begin. On the Naples – Cancello section activities to build the Casalnuovo tunnel in hyperbaric conditions, an innovative sustainable technique used for the very first time in Italy, also continue. While, at the end of August, works to raise the last metal deck of the section also were completed. The deck weighs an overall 700 tonnes and allows passing over the “Asse Mediano” high-speed road near Afragola in Naples.
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