Swietelsky is expanding the federal capital’s underground railway over the next few years. Wiener Linien commissioned a consortium – consisting of one third each from Swietelsky, Hochtief and Habau – with the realization of two construction lots for the U2 and the new U5 lines. The total order volume of the consortium is around 242 million euros. The construction work is expected to take six years.
Swietelsky, the third largest construction company in Austria, has already worked on earlier subway projects in Vienna. The group employs around 11,000 people and estimates its annual construction output at around three billion euros. We are now pleased to be able to continue this tradition, says CEO Karl Weidlinger: “Including preparatory work commissioned outside of the consortium, Swietelsky alone has an order volume of 92 million euros for the current Vienna underground project.”
With the groundbreaking at the future U5 station Frankhplatz, construction work on the city’s largest transport project has officially started. The aim is to extend the U2 towards Matzleinsdorfer Platz and to work on the first section of the new U5 to Frankhplatz. The financing agreement is still pending for the further planned expansion of the two lines. Last week, Transport Minister Leonore Gewessler, Finance Minister Gernot Blümel, Finance and Transport City Councilor Peter Hanke and Wiener Linien Managing Director Günter Steinbauer were present at the event.
The U2xU5 line intersection is the first subway project in the city center since the U3 was built in the 1990s. Around 370,000 people live and work in the immediate catchment area of the new routes and benefit directly from the network expansion. Overall, the expansion of the U2xU5 public transport system creates capacity for 300 million additional passengers. And the environment is also massively relieved with the expansion of the subway. Up to 75,000 tons of CO2 can be saved annually by shifting car traffic to public transport.
Wiener Linien managing director Günter Steinbauer described the official construction period as “challenging”. In general, subways are “the central, environmentally relevant lifelines in a city. The U2 and U5 lines are real main arteries for public transport and climate protection. With U2xU5 we are creating additional capacities for the public transport network of the future and environmentally friendly urban planning.”
For around 10 days, the U2xU5 Rathaus / Frankhplatz consortium has been working on the underground construction at the U2xU5 Rathaus and U5 Frankhplatz stations. The diversion route for traffic has already been set up so that the construction areas necessary for the construction work can be cleared immediately afterwards. For example, the asphalt is removed in the corresponding areas, sidewalk edges are removed and the construction site areas are fenced off.
Construction work on the stations and subway shafts at the Rathaus and Frankhplatz stations will begin in March. Bored piles up to 60 meters long secure the shafts, which are then subsequently excavated. An additional construction shaft is being built in the area of the Schottentor station, next to the university, so that the U2 can turn onto its new route in the direction of Matzleinsdorfer Platz. The connection to the existing U2 route will be established from the end of May as part of the necessary partial closure of the U2.
The first tunneling work according to the New Austrian Tunneling Method (NÖT) will probably start in the town hall section in mid-2022 and at Frankhplatz in spring 2023. This diverse mining construction method is used when the subsoil and structure geometry require greater flexibility. To do this, the groundwater must be lowered by means of a well. The necessity due to the prevailing geology in this area was found out in advance, in the course of the test drilling along the new route.
Until the completion of the U5 lines to Frankhplatz 2026 and the U2 line to Matzleinsdorfer Platz 2028, the federal government, the City of Vienna and Wiener Linien will invest around 2.1 billion euros in the U2xU5 project of the century.
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