COPENHAGEN, March 13 (Alliance News): Europe is undertaking an ambitious undersea tunnel project, the Fehmarnbelt, designed to connect Denmark and Germany via a two-lane highway and two electrified rail lines under the Baltic Sea.
Spanning 18 kilometers, it will become the world’s longest immersed tunnel upon completion in 2029.
The project, estimated at €7.4 billion, employs prefabricated concrete sections lowered into a trench on the seafloor.
The first tunnel sections were recently transported from Denmark’s Rødbyhavn factory, a 220-hectare facility producing one 217-meter-long element every nine weeks.
Once operational, the Fehmarnbelt tunnel will drastically reduce travel times, cutting ferry travel from 45 minutes to just 10 minutes by car and seven minutes by train.
The Hamburg-to-Copenhagen train journey will also be reduced from five hours to 2.5 hours.
Tourism officials predict the tunnel will boost sustainable travel and economic activity in Denmark and the broader Scandinavian region.
With ongoing construction on the tunnel portals in Rødbyhavn and Puttgarden, the project marks a major leap in European transportation infrastructure.
