40 meters below the Baltic Sea, the world's longest tunnel connecting Denmark and Germany will be submerged, cutting travel times between the two countries when it opens in 2029. CNN Travel he says:
After more than a decade of planning, construction of the Fehmarnbelt tunnel began in 2020, following the completion of a temporary port on the Danish side. It will house the factory that will soon build the 89 massive concrete sections that will make up the tunnel. "The expectation is that the first production line will be ready around the end of the year or early next year," said Henrik Vincentsen, CEO of Femern A/S, the Danish state-owned company in charge of the project. . "By the beginning of 2024 we should be ready to sink the first part of the tunnel."
The tunnel, which will be 18 kilometers long, will be one of the largest infrastructure projects in Europe, with a construction budget of more than 7 billion euros. It will be built along the Fehmarn Belt, a strait between the German island of Fehmarn and the Danish island of Lolland. It is designed as an alternative to the current ferry service from Rodby and Puttgarden, which carry millions of passengers each year. Where the crossing now takes 45 minutes by ferry, it will take seven minutes by train and 10 minutes by car. The tunnel, whose official name is the Fehmarnbelt Fixed Link, will also be the world's longest combined road and rail tunnel. It will include two dual-lane highways and two electrified rail lines.
"Today, if you took a train trip from Copenhagen to Hamburg, it would take you about four and a half hours," says Jens Ole Kaslund, technical director of Femern A/S, the Danish state-owned company responsible for the project. "When the tunnel is completed, the same journey will take two and a half hours."