A tunnel from just east of Elevator Road under the Annieville and Sunbury Neighbourhoods and exiting at Nordel Way and Highway 91 would resolve most of the problems with the current SFPR route - protecting the environment and reducing the neighbourhood impacts of noise and exhaust pollution.
Nov 5, 2006 - An independent engineer reviews the Gateway analysis of the tunnel option and provides his own ideas.
June 16, 2006 - Gateway's tunnel estimates are challenged
For the past 14 months, we have been asking Gateway for a detailed analysis of the costs and benefits of a tunnel route vs their riverside route. At the end of May, 2006 they provided us with the following analysis:
In our response, we outline the gaps in their analysis:
Sunbury Response to Gateway Route Analysis
TUNNEL PROJECTs
17 in Canada including 3 in BC
121 projects in Spain, 57 in Austria, 61 France, 65 Germany...... http://www.tunnelbuilder.com/countryfiles_index.htm
Searching the tunnelling projects world wide for highways and there are a lot of them, here are what I have estimated to be the closest comparables:
So where are Mr Proudfoot's numbers? By these projects I can't see how the tunnel is out of line. We are boring through a pile of gravel with some sand and clay thrown in as adhesives. Mr. Proudfoot/Gateway should be held to bring something to the table and prove the tunnel too costly. I believe that should be part of the public consultation. Don't you?
This is interesting;
Auckland - nz/13 Second Harbour Crossing Options under study for a
second harbour crossing near the Auckland Harbour Bridge, either a
bridge or a tunnel under the Waitemata Harbour and tunnel connections to
the north-western and south-western motorways, costing up to $2 billion.
Any tunnel must fit plans for the extension of State Highway 20 through
Avondale. The cheapest option is to widen or build a new viaduct. Second
option is to put the motorway in a trench through Victoria Park for
$220-$250 million. Third option is a partial or full tunnel under
Victoria Park at a cost of $150-$290 million. The fourth option is to
tunnel under Victoria Park and straighten the approach to the harbour
bridge, for a cost of $350-$430 million. Interesting they choose the
Tunnel, it's cheaper than the bridge!
In Tokyo a bypass tunnel on Madrid's 30 mile loop highway planned by that city's municipal government. The tunnel, scheduled to open in March 2007, is expected to help solve the chronic traffic jams, frequent accidents, noise and lack of greenery at the chosen site.
TUNCONSTRUCT, a Project to Boost the Use of Underground Space in
Europe
The utilization of underground space can have a significant impact on
living conditions. For example, underground trains greatly contribute to
the reduction of pollution and long base tunnels are innovative ideas
for sending freight underground. It is commonly admitted that
underground space is currently underused. It is possible to envisage a
city of the future that has virtually no vehicle traffic above ground,
thereby freeing space for parks and recreational facilities. One of the
reasons that underground space is underutilised is because, as compared
to above ground construction, underground construction is still too
risky and expensive.
The aim of the TUNCONSTRUCT project (an acronym which stands for
Technology innovation in Underground Construction) is to make
underground construction significantly less risky and expensive by
introducing innovative technology. The project should pave the way to
the introduction of innovative solutions that have been proposed for the
transport infrastructure and cities.
The integrated project TUNCONSTRUCT gathers many of the European main
players in industry, research and business in a consortium of more than
30 partners from 11 countries across Europe. The planned innovations
involve all aspects of underground construction and can be divided into
the following areas: prediction and design; construction equipment;
processes; and maintenance and repair. Visit
www.tunconstruct.org
04/06.
'It is unfortunate, land is pretty cheap here in Canada compared to other more populous regions of this little blue-green ball. Still that's no excuse for destroying the blue and green bits in favour of grey.' Paul R
Research collected by Brian White