A nifty BIM-type view of the proposed bored tunnel for Washington SR 99, the tunnel to replace the aging Alaskan Way Viaduct along Seattle’s waterfront. It’s pretty neat to see the piles and foundations for other structures and major utilities as the bore passes by them. A little on the longer size, at around 5 minutes.
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New Tunnel Project In Peru Through Andes
From ENR:
In the mountains of Peru a tunnel-boring machine named “Pacha Mama†is grinding through the heart of the Andes under rock as deep as 6,890 ft. It is carving away at a 20.2-kilometer-long tunnel through the South American Continental Divide to deliver water to arid coastal farmland.
This is a really interesting project, known as the Los Olmos project, and a nice little article. Normally for a civil tunnel project you drill geotechnical holes beforehand to know what kind of material you’re dealing with. In this case, because of the depth, they don’t have that luxury, so all decisions will be made on the fly. The depth of the tunnel creates some very challenging rock mechanics and logistics problems as well! (Illustration by Odebrecht)
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Tunnel-Boring Machines Are On the Move in New York City
There are a total of 7 TBM projects in the New York area either currently under construction, awarded or coming soon totaling roughly $4.7 billion! The caption on the nice summary table at the end […]
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Viaduct Inspections Show Settlement Problems Long Before Tunneling
The Alaskan Way Viaduct tunneling project was in the news late last year when settlement of the Viaduct was reported during the dewatering efforts for the Bertha TBM rescue shaft. A recent post by WSDOT […]