On July 5th, Changsha Xiangya Road river-crossing tunnel was opened to traffic. The tunnel is the largest diameter shield machine tunnel in Hunan Province, China. The opening of the tunnel will effectively alleviate traffic pressure on the nearby Yinpenling Bridge and Yingpan Road Tunnel, achieving the goal of interconnected networks and smooth traffic. The tunnel was constructed by CRCHI's (China Railway Construction Heavy Industry Corporation Limited) large-diameter slurry TBM"Xingsheng". The TBM started the left line tunnelling on March 30th, 2021 and started the right line tunnelling on June 20th, 2022. The twin-tunnel broke through on Mar 12th , 2023.
The Xiangya Road river-crossing tunnel project starts from Yuehua Road in Yuelu District in the west and extends to the Furong Road in Kaifu District in the east. The total investment of the project is 5.33 billion yuan. The project has a total length of 4,180 meters. The river-crossing section is constructed by shield machine tunnelling methods and has a approximately 1.4 kilometre length. The left line TBM tunnel is 1429 meters long, and the right line TBM tunnel is 1425 meters long. It is the first two-way six-lane river-crossing tunnel in Changsha. The shield machine tunnel passed under the Xiangjiang River dike four times and crossed two riverbed fracture zones of more than 450 meters in length, twice.
The "Xingsheng" slurry TBM has a maximum excavation diameter of 15.01 meters and an overall length of approximately 129 meters. The TBM adopted a heavy-duty composite cutterhead, high-wear and long-life cutting tools and a 7.6-meter heavy-duty main bearing design, which effectively resolved the impact issues on the cutterhead during the excavation of riverbed rock layers and composite strata. The frequency of cutter replacement was reduced, the excavation efficiency is increased, and the smooth construction of the tunnel was ensured. For further information about CRHI in the tunnelbuilder archive please click here and also visit CRCHI’s website by clicking the link http://www.crchi.com/
