After years of wrangling, excavation work on both sides of what is set to be the world’s longest underwater immersed-tube road and rail tunnel—an 18-km structure beneath the Baltic Sea between Germany and Denmark—finally got underway, with start of heavy construction on the German side in early December. The projected completion of the Fehmarnbelt Tunnel in 2029 will cut rail travel between Copenhagen and Hamburg to 2.5 hours, with trains set to travel at 200 km per hour.
Opposition has delayed the estimated $8.21-billion project for more than a decade, leading up to the German launch on the island of Fehmarn, which follows work getting underway in early 2021 on the Danish island of Lolland. Project opponents had kept lawsuits proceeding, with a court In Leipzig last year rejecting the final challenge to construction start. Site preparation for the German side excavation began at the end of March.