On the 04/12/2022 - celebrating Saint Barbara the patron saint of miners and tunnellers - there was a breakthrough between Polcevera and Cravasco work site in the Valico tunnel (odd track). This created a 11 km section of the new Valico tunnel, from the entrance to the Terzo Valico in Genoa, at the Figino crossroads, up to beyond Cravasco.   

The milestone brings to 30 km (82,1%) the total amount of excavation done for the tunnels planned for both directions of the future railway service thanks to a round-the-clock work schedule.

Works for Terzo Valico began in 2012.The excavation started at the southern end of the planned tunnels in the Liguria region and then proceeded underneath the mountain range towards the northern end of the project on the side in the Piemonte region.  

The  (Terzo Valico) Combined Project  will boost the capacity of the Port of Genoa to attract more commercial activity and will  join with the  breakwater dam (Diga Foranea) - improving logistics operations in Liguria and increasing the competitiveness of the entire country.  

The new high-speed/high-capacity railway will have a combined length of 53 km, 70% of which will be underground. It will cross 14 municipalities in the provinces of Genoa and Alessandria. The railway will have three rock tunnels Campasso (710 m), Serravalle (7,09 km) and Valico (27,25 km) and a cut&cover tunnel Pozzolo (1,98 km).

The work that is being done on various fronts is using two tunneling methods: the traditional drill and blast (58.1 km) , and the mechanised method with the use of TBMs (32.6 km). The railway will become an important part of the Rhine-Alpine Corridor of the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T). Travel times by train between Genoa and Milan will be reduced by 33% and is expected to contribute to the reduction of CO2 emissions by 55%. 

Click here and it/208 for tunnelbuilder archive. For further on the project visit https://terzovalico.webuildgroup.com/,  https://www.fsitaliane.it/ and  https://www.terzovalico.it/. 49/22.