The new tunnel will be the first infrastructure to be built across the Thames since 1991, increasing public transport provision sixfold upon its commissioning. The project, which is being undertaken by London’s public transport authority Transport for London (TfL), is the largest road investment in this area of the city in the last 30 years. It includes the design and construction of 1.4 kilometres twin bored tunnels under the River Thames, which, together with the cut-and-cover tunnels at both ends, add up to a total tunnel length of 2 kilometres. The design also includes the necessary road works and junctions for tunnel access. With a budget of more than one billion pounds, the project has been awarded to the RiverLinx consortium, which is responsible for its design, execution, financing, operation and maintenance. RiverLinx is made up of Spanish operator Cintra, construction companies Ferrovial-Agroman and BAM Nuttal, engineering firms SK E&C, designers Ayesa, Arup, Cowi and financiers Aberdeen Standard Investment and Macquarie Capital. 

General layout of the route of the tunnel under the River Thames.

In turn, RiverLinx has contracted Ineco/RPS joint venture as an Independent Certifier throughout the design and construction process. As such, Ineco is participating in the construction of the tunnel, bringing its extensive experience in the supervision of particularly complex tunnels. The contract is being executed through a joint venture with the company RPS, in which Ineco has a 57% shareholding. Both companies will provide support as an Independent Certifier until the commissioning of the new tunnel. The design phase started in 2020, with work scheduled for completion in 2025. 

 Less traffic jams, better connections

Currently, the only means of crossing the Thames in this area of the city is the Blackwall Tunnel, which has been in service for over 120 years, with very high levels of congestion (over 48,000 vehicles per day in each direction) and gauge limitations. It is estimated that more than one million hours of congestion are generated each year due to tunnel capacity constraints, with an economic impact of 10 million pounds each year. 

Ineco is contributing its experience in the supervision of particularly complex tunnels

The new tunnel will be the first road crossing under the River Thames since the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge opened on the outskirts of London more than 30 years ago. It is estimated that the tunnel’s area of influence will see an increase in population of 650,000 people and the creation of 286,000 new jobs by 2036. Once operational, it will enable a six-fold increase in public transport capacity in this area of London. Today, due to the limitations of the tunnels, there is only one bus service that allows crossing between the two eastern neighbourhoods of the city. The new tunnel will have one bus lane in each direction, allowing an increase to 37 bus services per hour. All services will also be operated with zero-emission vehicles. 

TfL estimates that improving congestion in and around Blackwall will significantly reduce journey times. Studies predict that, without the Silvertown Tunnel, both traffic and emissions from congestion in the Blackwall Tunnel would increase in the coming years, such that morning rush hour delays in east and south-east London could increase by more than 20% on average. The new infrastructure will help to improve air quality in this area of the city by reducing congestion and increasing the flow of public transport, as well as making connections north and south of the river more resilient.

Description of the works

In addition to the tunnels, the works include the design of the accesses and the roads connecting them to the existing network, which are largely developed using open cut and cut-and-cover techniques by means of  slurry walls, sheet piling, micropiles and in-situ walls.

The tunnel is made up of two tubes built with an EPB TBM (Tunelling Boring Machine) of 12 m in diameter to accommodate a cross section with two unidirectional lanes of 3.50 m for each tube, with one of the lanes being exclusively for the circulation of buses, including double-deckers, and freight transport. 

The tunnel boring machine was manufactured in Germany by Herrenknecht. It is approximately 82 m long, weighs around 1,800 tonnes and will have a cutting surface of almost 12 m. 

The new tunnel will be the first road crossing under the River Thames for more than 30 years

Following the execution schedule, the tunnel boring machine will start boring the first tube (southbounds) from Silvertown, where the launch chamber is located, turn around in North Greenwich at the rotation chamber and continue boring the second tube back to Silvertown to the extraction shaft. The infrastructure will include seven cross passages connecting the tubes at 150 m spacing.

Overall, the construction team will manage a total excavation of 600,000 m³ and 100% of the extracted material will be transported by river, minimising the impact of construction traffic on neighbouring communities and roads.

The project also incorporates maintenance buildings and road works and surface links, including an overbridge and a pedestrian and cycling bridge. The works are expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2025 and will be located within the ultra-low emission zone.

For a city like Madrid and its metropolitan area, which is home to 7.3 million people and constitutes Spain’s largest conurbation, underground infrastructure such as the metro, commuter trains, walkways and transfer stations play a vital role in ensuring that the transport system is able to flow. Without them, there would be insufficient space at surface level to absorb the volume of passengers. The metro alone carries 677 million people per year, according to data for 2019.

Of the 300-plus stations in the network, Sol is the busiest by a significant distance, with 24.4 million passengers in 2019. And that is not its only record: it is also the oldest station, as it was the starting-point of the city’s first metro line, Sol-Cuatro Caminos, which opened in 1919. Following major extension work in 2009, Sol boasts the world’s largest station cavern, measuring over 200 metres long by 20 metres wide and 15 metres high.

TUNNEL INCLINE. The image is a cross-section of the tunnel, showing the 12-metre incline between Sol commuter station and Gran Vía metro station. Accessibility is provided by four moving walkways.

After this expansion, which followed the entry into service of the new tunnel between the two major railway stations of Atocha (to the south) and Chamartín (to the north), Sol was reopened as a transfer station, with access to three metro lines and two commuter lines (located at the deepest level). Here, at the end of the vast station cavern, a pedestrian tunnel was built in order to provide a link to another of Madrid’s historic stations, Gran Vía, located a little over 100 metres away beneath Montera street. After the initial structure was built, the tunnel remained closed while work was carried out on the metro and commuter branch lines.

Working on behalf of Adif, Ineco drew up the plans and supervised the work to prepare the tunnel for its entry into service. Work began in 2018 and recommenced in early 2021, while the Community of Madrid finalised the expansion of Gran Vía station. Work on the two projects was coordinated, and both facilities were opened at the same time in July 2021. The new pedestrian tunnel will increase the flow of passengers to a station that already ranks among the busiest. Madrid Metro estimates that the station will receive an additional 22,000 users per day, in addition to the 44,000 who already do so.

Key characteristics of a deep-lying site

In 2009, during the renovation of Sol station, the tunnel was bored out and a series of arched reinforced concrete sections installed, totalling 120 metres long by 5.7 metres wide. The route runs parallel to Calle Montera, above the railway tunnel, and ascends by approximately 12 metres on its way towards Gran Vía.

The plan drawn up by Ineco in 2018 detailed all of the actions required to make the tunnel operational: clad the concrete walls with vandal-proof materials; install all of the systems for lighting, ventilation, security, fire-fighting, communications, signalling, access control and ticket machines at the entrance to Gran Vía station; and install four large moving walkways to overcome the incline. Adif also commissioned Ineco to provide site management services and coordinate health and safety for the construction work, which was carried out by Tragsa.

As well as coordination with other major projects that were undergoing implementation, these works had the added complexity of being carried out 20 metres underground. Not only that, but they were done while Sol station remained fully operational. Consequently, in order to transport the moving walkways (which were originally going to be brought from Gran Vía), draisines –track-based transport vehicles (1)– were used to carry the walkways to the platforms in sections (2). There, they were hoisted up to the mezzanine (the intermediate floor above the platforms, where the tunnel is located) using a block and tackle system (3), and then transferred into the tunnel using rolling platforms (4 and 5) and placed inside the excavated pits (6). These operations required meticulous planning and great precision in order to avoid damaging the station, and were carried out at night so that they did not interfere with normal operation.

POSITIONING THE WALKWAYS.

Another notable innovation is that, owing to its unique layout and design, the tunnel can be used as an evacuation route in the event of an emergency. In coordination with Renfe, Adif and the Madrid Metro, evacuation signalling has been installed in accordance with a specially designed and coordinated fire-protection and ventilation system, which means the tunnel can be used in a number of different emergency scenarios depending on where the emergency originates.

The new Gran Vía metro station, in the heart of Madrid, opened in July under the replica of the historic 1920s pavilion designed by the architect Antonio Palacios.

The new station has three levels. In the first, there is a large vestibule that will grow from 900 m² to 2,000 m²; in the second, a museum will be created with the archaeological remains that have come to light during the works; and in the third, the connection with Metro line 5 and the pedestrian gallery with the Renfe Cercanías in Sol station, which has also entered into service. Ineco has carried out the project and managed the works for Adif. Thanks to this tunnel, 66,000 passengers a day will be able to transfer directly to Gran Vía station without the need to go outside.

The United Nations Economic Committee for Europe (UNECE) published its case study on Line 1 of Tenerife Light Metro in September. The studies are provided to Governments as models of best public-private collaboration practices to achieve the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

The case study was prepared by IESE PPP for Cities (Specialist Center on PPP in Smart and Sustainable Cities), with the collaboration of Ineco, and it highlights where the project met the SDGs such as: use of clean energy, improvements to public infrastructure, commitment to sustainable cities, the fight against climate change and collaboration between the public and private sectors.

Ineco was a shareholder and was involved from the beginning in the planning and construction of the two lines of Tenerife Light Metro, opened in 2007 and 2009.

Ineco, together with Italian engineering firm Systematica, will provide consulting and technical assistance services for two years to update and improve Malta’s National Transport Model, as well as to develop a complete technical framework for the next five years. This consortium was already designated by Transport Malta in 2014 to develop the National Transport Master Plan to be finished in 2025 and the National Transport Strategy 2050. The works included the preparation of the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA).

Apps that predict the location of traffic jams; optimised street lighting and irrigation for green spaces; train stations that communicate with taxi and bike operators; smart airports that recognise passengers; and digitalised ports that connect ships to the power grid to reduce their engine emissions… The functionalities provided by artificial intelligence, Big Data and robotics are already a reality that is transforming the mobility of our cities, which, according to the UN, are home to 55% of the world’s population. The goal is to exploit all of our technological resources to make them more efficient and, above all, more sustainable and environmentally-friendly.

With this in mind, the UN Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) convened the tenth session of the World Urban Forum, which was hosted by the emirate of Abu Dhabi from the 8 to 13 February 2020. A group of businesses backed by the Ministry for Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda together operated a 100m² stand at the event: Adif, Aena, Puertos del Estado, Renfe and Ineco were among those in attendance to present their proposals for more sustainable, inclusive, safe and resilient cities.

The forum, under the motto of Cities of Opportunities: Connecting Culture and Innovation, is the principal international stage for debating and sharing experiences related to urban issues

At the forum, the Spanish government also presented Spain’s Urban Agenda, the result of its commitment to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. The Agenda, approved in 2019, is a roadmap that aims to guide all of Spain’s towns and cities, regardless of their size, towards a more economically, socially and environmentally equitable, integrated and sustainable future by the year 2030. The Agenda offers a Decalogue of Strategic Goals, which, in turn, feature a total of 30 specific goals and 291 lines of action.

The forum, under the motto of ‘Cities of Opportunities: Connecting Culture and Innovation’, is the principal international stage for debating and sharing experiences related to urban issues The event was attended by more than 18,000 delegates from approximately 170 countries, representing mostly institutions, ranging from national and local governments, non-governmental organisations, the private sector and the academic world.

One of the organisations in attendance was Spanish railway operator Renfe. The rail operator, which presented the Haramain project at the stand, is working on its new ‘mobility as a service’, ‘Renfe as a Service (RaaS)’ platform back in Spain. The platform aims to integrate different modes of both public and private transport into one single application.

In addition, Puertos del Estado, which comprises and coordinates the 28 port authorities in charge of Spain’s 46 ports, presented its Ports 4.0 project. The Ports 4.0 project establishes an equity fund to finance innovative projects in new technologies and business models based on the 4.0 economy, via a public requests for tenders.

In the aviation sector, Spanish airport operator Aena is focusing on the concept of smart airports: its lines of action include a pilot project for biometric technology and digital identity (facial recognition) at its Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas airport and its airport in Menorca, as well as testing drones for different uses within the airport environment.

Adif, Spain’s railway infrastructure administrator, has activated a plan to digitalise its network of long-distance and AVE train stations, aiming to convert them into ‘intelligent stations’ that will connect to other transport systems and different city services. 

Smart projects from Ineco

Cityneco: LAUNCHED IN GRANADA

The Director of Ineco, José Ángel Higueras, (first from the right) presents the Cityneco model to the Ministry of Transport’s Deputy Director of Urban Policy, Ángela de la Cruz (centre). / PHOTO_INECO + LUMIERE ADVERTISERS

Ineco demonstrated its Cityneco Mobility model at the stand. The model city, constructed from Lego pieces, allowed delegates to observe the functions of its Cityneco platform through its augmented reality application. The company developed the technology platform for the smart management of different urban services in 2016, as part of an innovation project in which it partnered with the Granada City Council to pilot the platform in the city. The platform has since been updated to a new version 2.0.

Specifically designed to facilitate mobility, the model’s modular architecture and layered structure make it easily scalable and interoperable. A Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) version makes Cityneco available to medium-sized cities without their own infrastructure.

A visitor tests virtual reality glasses. / PHOTO_INECO + LUMIERE ADVERTISERS

The platform features several vertical modules, one for each of a local council or organisation’s management areas. Its modular architecture facilitates the incorporation of new vertical levels to adapt to new requirements. Its IoT functionality (the Internet of Things), allows it to connect to sensors located throughout the city while simultaneously integrating and processing multiple sources of information, from social networks to video feed.

The information is displayed simply and intuitively through dashboards, based on both real-time data and management indicators, and in the case of mobility, with a GIS viewer (Geographical Information System).

A connected campus for the University of Almería

The University of Almería (UAL), founded in 1993, is not the first Spanish university to introduce smart-management projects for its services and infrastructure, but it is the first to have a Master Plan for their implementation, which it asked Ineco to design. With a few methodological adjustments, the document incorporates smart-management proposals similar to those that would be applied to a small city.

The work, which was carried out over the course of 2019, includes a model for a smart campus, a diagnosis of the University’s current state of technological or smart development, the objective to be achieved and a roadmap of necessary actions.

View of the UAL campus. / PHOTO_UAL

At just over five kilometres east of the city of Almería and a few meters from the sea, the UAL is a small to medium-sized public university situated very close to the Natural Park of Cabo de Gata-Níjar. Despite being located in a water-deficient province, the university benefits from abundant sunshine and regular winds that it can use to obtain clean energy. The plan, therefore, concentrates on environmental initiatives to create a green smart-campus with particular emphasis placed on optimising its water and energy consumption. Given its location outside of the city centre, which makes access on foot difficult and generates high levels of private vehicle use, another priority is to improve the university’s mobility framework.

The UAL is the first Spanish university to have a Master Plan for the implementation of SMART-MANAGEMENT initiatives thanks to Ineco

In total, the plan covers 21 services, grouped in nine sub-areas: urban environment (maintenance and irrigation of gardens, air quality, noise and light pollution), waste management (cleaning roads and buildings, and waste collection), energy (electricity and gas consumption in buildings, public lighting, clean energy generation), water (water consumption and quality, sanitation and sewage network management), parking (car park management), traffic control (vehicle influx, internal bicycle and scooter traffic, charging points for electric vehicles, information on modes of transport), accessibility, public infrastructure and urban equipment, (management and maintenance, incident detection) and an innovation ecosystem.

Below: bicycles parked in front of lecture theatre IV; promoting sustainable mobility is a cornerstone of the plan. / PHOTO_UAL

In order to establish the current technological advancement of the services, six levels were defined: basic, initiation (UAL’s current level) intermediate, advanced, very advanced and connected. The objective is to reach the ‘connected’ level, which specifies that at least 80% of the services must be interconnected.

The Master Plan includes indicators to measure UAL’s smart progress and establishes a Steering and Coordination Committee and a Monitoring Committee, as well as suggesting a two-yearly revision of the document to keep it up to date.

Buenos Aires’ new urban motorway, the Paseo del Bajo, won the award for Best Urban Works 2019 at the Argentine Road Association Awards, which is organised annually to mark Argentina’s National Road Day. The award recognises the impact that the Paseo del Bajo has had on reducing the city’s traffic congestion and improving north-south connectivity thanks to four new semi-covered lanes and the remodelling of eight surface lanes totalling more than six kilometres in length.

Ineco, in collaboration with its local partner AC&A, carried out the inspection of section B of the works (southern semi-covered trench), a semi-underground four-lane road intended for heavy goods vehicle traffic in the centre of Buenos Aires. With a length of 7.1 kilometres, it is one of the most important civil works that has ever been carried out in Argentina and has enabled the Buenos Aires-La Plata and Illia motorways to be connected and new green spaces in Buenos Aires’ El Bajo district to be created.

According to the municipal government, more than 134,000 residents of Buenos Aires benefit directly from the Paseo del Bajo, a new 7.1 kilometre road corridor that opened in May and crosses the city from north to south, connecting the Buenos Aires-La Plata and Illia highways. It has a total of 12 lanes, four of which run in the semi-depressed central road section (trench) that is exclusively for heavy vehicles and operates as a highway: according to the Buenos Aires Department of Urban Development and Transport, every day more than 15,300 lorries weighing 12 tonnes or more and more than 800 coaches travel this section.

The rest of the traffic –which consists of approximately 76,000 private vehicles per day and public transport– uses the eight surface lanes located on both sides of the trench, four on each side (two in each direction), on Avenidas Alicia Moureau and Huergo. The left-hand lanes are designed for through traffic and cars are not allowed to stop. The project also included the construction of nine bridges along the Paseo to connect both sides of the road and 60,000 m² of green areas, bicycle lanes and a large pedestrian stairway by the Puente de la Mujer bridge, which connects Plaza de Mayo to the Puerto Madero district of the city.

Ineco’s participation

Beginning in 2017, Ineco, together with its local partner AC&A, carried out inspection work for AUSA (Autopistas Urbanas SA) on the new infrastructure’s section B, the ‘southern semi-covered trench,’ which was opened to traffic on 27 May after several days of events and in an atmosphere of celebration: it was a project that was long-awaited by the three million inhabitants of the Argentine capital, which, together with its metropolitan area, has a population of around 12 million people.

It is one of the most important civil works projects in the country and, thanks to it, travel time has been reduced from 50 to 10 minutes

It is one of the most important civil works projects in the country and, thanks to it, travel time has been reduced from 50 minutes to 10 minutes. The new road enables cargo traffic to travel from the Buenos Aires-La Plata highway, cross the city centre without having to stop for traffic lights and directly access the port and Retiro bus terminal.

The Mexican capital, which changed its name in January 2016 from the Federal District to Mexico City, is an enormous metropolitan area with a population of almost 21 million inhabitants, making it the largest city in Latin America and one of the largest in the world. The backbone of the city’s public transport system –which includes buses, trolleybuses, trams and commuter rail– is its almost 200-kilometre-long metro network, which transports approximately 8 million passengers a day spread among its 12 lines and 195 stations.

The Line 12 extension route.

Ineco, through its subsidiary Inecomex, together with its partner in the country, Cal y Mayor y Asociados, is carrying out the comprehensive management of the project (project management) for the management, coordination and monitoring of the Mixcoac-Observatorio extension of Line 12, also known as the Golden Line, the newest line in the CDMX Metro network. This line opened on 30 October 2012, has 20 stations and has a total length of 24.5 kilometres. It is located in the southern part of Mexico City and runs east to west. It connects to other lines in the system: Line 7 in Mixcoac; Line 3 in Zapata; Line 2 in Ermita and Line 8 in Atlalilco.

Management of Line 12

A team of more than 80 professionals is responsible for managing the works, which include the construction of 4.6 kilometres of tunnel –with the main tunnel covering 3.6 kilometres– and three new stations: Valentín Campa, Álvaro Obregon and Observatorio, where it will connect to Lines 1 and 9. The section also has 13 skylights, some of which will also serve as emergency exits, rectification substations and larger ventilation units.

Inecomex and Cal y Mayor are providing senior management services for this complex project, with teams of renowned experts at the national and international levels in different specialities to ensure efficiency and compliance with the project’s targets in terms of budget, deadlines, scope and quality. The consortium has also collaborated on monitoring environmental and urban impact measures and its tasks also include the coordination of the rolling stock tests.

The project will include the building of a new 4.6-kilometre section and three new stations: valentín campa, álvaro obregón and observatorio

Once the line is in operation, the new extension will represent a major improvement in mobility between the west and south of the city and will reduce the saturation of Lines 1, 2 and 3. The future Observatorio station will also allow connection to the new Mexico-Toluca interurban train service. From the environmental point of view, it is estimated that the emission of more than 3,700 tons of CO₂ per year, or the equivalent of almost 6 million vehicles, will be avoided.

The consortium

The Inecomex-Cal y Mayor consortium is managing all phases of the Line 12 extension project: design, planning, execution of works and management of material and financial resources. The consortium is also collaborating on monitoring environmental and urban impact measures and will coordinate rolling stock tests.

An aerial view of the Calle E skylight.

The Peruvian capital will soon have a public transport master plan drafted by Ineco and another Spanish engineering company, Typsa. The two companies won an international tender called by Peru’s Autonomous Electric Transportation System Authority (AATE), part of the Ministry of Transport and Communications, with the cooperation of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). The plan, which has a time horizon of 2050, will analyse demand, define a fare policy and determine the location of the metro’s interchange stations with future suburban lines. It will also include master plans for the metro and other transportation systems (bus and metrobus), and strategic environmental assessment of the projects, among other aspects.