The construction contract for the EUR133 million Lai Chi Kok Transfer Scheme, advertised at tunnelbuilder.com earlier this year, has been awarded to Leighton Asia. The project includes two 4.9 m-diameter storm water drainage tunnels with total length of 3.7 km between West Kowloon reclamation and Lai Chi Kok and Sham Shui Po districts, six intake shafts, a stilling basin, an outfall adit into Victoria Harbour, and 270 m of 3 m-diameter connection adits. Work starts immediately for completion in 2012. More from Quinnie Lee, tel +852 2823 1427, e-mail quinnie.lee@leightonasia.com 47/08..

Contract valued EUR414,000 awarded by Norwegian Railway Infrastructure Administration to Norconsult AS of Sandvika to provide technical and detailed plans of tunnels for the joint project E6 road and Dovrebanen, lot Minnesund-Kleverud, which includes one twin-tube 0.6 km-long road tunnel and 3.1 km of single railway tunnel over a 17 km-long alignment in Eidsvoll and Stange municipalities. ..

Contract for telecommunications installations for 6.5 km section of new double railway track in Baerum municipality for Lysaker-Sandvika, of which 5.5 km in tunnel, awarded by Jernbaneverket to T Connect AS of Manglerud, Oslo. http://ted.europa.eu/udl?request=Seek-Deliver&language=en&docid=292852-2008 More from Olaf Bjerknes, tel +47 9943 4144, e-mail olbj@jbv.no 46/08. ..

Bemel Norge AS of Majorstuen, Oslo has been awarded the contract to supply ventilation fans to the 5.37 km-long Atlantic Ocean tunnel between Kristiansund and Bremnes on National Road 64 in the value EUR555,000...

Pre-feasibility study being undertaken by ILF Consulting Engineers for construction of single track railway line along the Karakorum highway between the end of the existing railway network in the south at Havelian and the border between Pakistan and China near the famous Khunjrab Pass in the north.

Prequalification underway by MTR for tender reference no 703 for West Island Line SHW to SYP tunnels value EUR30 million with a view to selective invitations to tender being issued in 4Q/2008 for contract award in 3Q/2009. Expressions of interest to Malcolm O’Neill, tel 3921 3383, e-mail moneill@mtr.com.hk Visit www.mtr.com.hk/eng/tenders/new_projects.html 45/08.

Prior information notice for construction works, value EUR24.86 million, for a undergroung cut-and-cover tunnel from Pabellon Moises Ruiz to Plaza de Barcelona, 1,1 km, with 0.8 m-thick base, 1.0 m-thick walls and 1.0 m-thick roof, on Carretera de Ronda, in Almeria. The works will include intermodal station.

Efficient traffic enforcement requires measuring systems using digital cameras instead of wet film technology. The digital file containing the image data and the measured speed and/or other values are transferred to a central office without personnel at place. A type approval for such a system has to ensure the authenticity and integrity of these data with the goal of being accepted as evidence at court. The company Robot has developed a speed-measuring instrument using a digital camera system that has been type approved and is used by the German police since 2003. The Aubing tunnel in Munich will be equipped soon. 15/08.

Professor Arnold Dix has addressed the International Water Mist Association conference in Munich, advising members to exercise corporate responsibility when promoting new technologies and to market them as part of an integrated approach to tunnel safety. Click here for the full text of his talk. More papers from IWMA will be published at ti.com over the coming weeks.

Canada’s International Bridges and Tunnels Act will provide the federal government with the legislative authority to ensure effective oversight of the existing 24 international vehicular bridges and tunnels and nine international railway bridges and tunnels, as well as any new international bridges or tunnels built in the future. This legislation will help ensure that the bridges and tunnels continue to be safe and well-maintained, security plans are put in place and that Canada’s vital trade links are preserved. 14/08.

The 2.2 km Lefortovo tunnel in Moscow has been nicknamed the "tunnel of death" by local motorists, and watching the video it is not hard to see why. Running underneath the Yauza river, which flows through the city, its roof has started leaking water on to the road. On very cold days, when the Russian winter temperatures regularly drop to -12°C, the water then turns to ice, making the surface dangerously slippy.

Fire safety in road tunnels is challenging because of the specific features of the tunnel environment. The sustainability of existing tunnels, given the increased road traffic and changed vehicle mix, needs innovative design practices. For example, reliable and early fire detection in tunnels can provide the tunnel operator with early warnings of fire and its location, allowing for timely activation of the emergency response such as the emergency ventilation system. Safety must be integrated as early as possible during the design phase of the tunnel and be always re-assessed when construction begins. 14/08.

The last section of the Seriate-Nembro-Albino-Gazzaniga road link has been opened to traffic. The 3,378 m Montenegrone tunnel, the longest tunnel in Bergamo province, is the main engineering piece on the new section. 13/08.

Several property and construction companies are in trouble as the housing market grinds to a halt. Some 60% of bank loans are property-related. Unemployment is rising fast. But the Spanish government is already preparing a public works programme to absorb some of the workforce laid off by the building industry, and is proposing to use the budget surplus, currently running at 2% of gross domestic product, to fund the new programme. 13/08.

The tunnels on Lyon’s north ring road and the Fourvière tunnel, on highway A6 crossing Lyon, must undergo comprehensive safety upgrades to bring them in line with standards. The studies carried out by Greater Lyon and an independent expert on these tunnels revealed several flaws. 12/08.

The opening of the 2,695 m Gousselerbierg tunnel by Grand Duke Henri has seen the northern highway in Luxembourg extended by four kilometres. The 4-lane road links Mersch and Lintgen and is hoped to ease congestion of road traffic to and from Lorentzweiler and Walferdange. 12/08

The Millennium Hongqiao Hotel in Shanghai will host the China Tunnel Summit 2008 on 20th and 21st March, 2008. The summit will bring together scholars, senior experts and prominent professionals with rich practical experience in the field of tunnelling to evaluate the past, analyse the present and forecast the future trend of the industry. The summit establishes a platform for all the participants to communicate and exchange experience.

Ventilation and safety for the new Channel Tunnel Rail Link across London is controlled by a dual redundant system of programmable automation controllers (PACs) which link into the SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) located at the Eurostar control centre based at Ashford in Kent. 11/08.

The new fixed link through the Eiksund strait on road Rv 653 includes the world’s deepest road tunnel under the Eiksund strait and two mainland tunnels. The new crossing has just been opened to traffic to the benefit of 22,000 people. It replaces the car ferry connection between Eiksund and Rjånes on the west coast of Norway, in the county of More & Romsdal. 10/08

Faster, more frequent, and more punctual high speed Eurostar trains between London and Brussels and Paris began operating on 14th November, 2007 as phase two of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL2), now known as High Speed 1, was officially opened. The new St Pancras International station in central London opened to the public at 9:00 am (British time) and the first train departed for Paris at 11:03 am. Three minutes later, the first commercial passenger train left for Brussels before the first arrival from the same city pulled into St Pancras, at 11:09 am. The first train arrived at Gare du Nord station in Paris on schedule at just before 2:15 pm French time. It was named Tread Lightly, after Eurostar's environmentally-friendly "green" campaign aimed at cutting its carbon dioxide emissions by 25% by 2012. Travelling on board Eurostar trains, passengers will have the extra reassurance of knowing that they are making far less environmental impact compared with flying. Rail Link Engineering (RLE), a consortium of Arup, Bechtel, Halcrow and Systra, were together responsible for the project management, consents, design, procurement, construction management and commissioning of the line. Visit www.arup.com, www.bechtel.com, www.halcrow.com and www.systra.com

Chancellor Gerhard Schröder inaugurated on 5th July the nearly 8 km-long Rennsteig tunnel, Germany's longest road tunnel linking Thuringia, formerly in communist east Germany, with Bavaria to the south, across what was once the Cold War inner-German border. The tunnel, which runs beneath the Thuringia forest hills, is part of the €1.5 billion A71 highway project extending 83 km from Erfurt, Thuringia's regional capital, to Meiningen. The west tube is 7,916 m-long and the east tube 7,878 m. Approximately 1.35 million cubic metres of spoil was removed. Each tube is connected to the other by cross passages every 300 m. The tunnel is equipped with Zitrón ventilation systems. The tunnel cost €250 million to build. It opened to traffic on 7th July and is part of a 16.5 km section which includes three other tunnels (Alte Burg, 874 m and 866 m; Hochwald, 2 x 1,058 m; Berg Bock, 2,750 m and 2,729 m). To view a video clip of the inauguration, click here. Click de/13. Visit www.a71.de and www.xs4all.nl/~zitronnl/Rennsteig 29/03.

Further to equipping the 3,820 m Nefise-Akçelik tunnel, the longest road tunnel in Turkey opened to traffic in April 2007, with the latest traffic control technology, Siemens is now supplying equipment to 29 tunnels on a highway along the eastern Black Sea coast. 08/08.