17 December 2024 , 20:35
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Norway is building a futuristic new underwater tunnel for cars with floating sections which will dramatically reduce journey times.
The new 17-mile Rogfast tunnel will transform a 21-hour journey by cutting it in half – at the expense of swapping views of the majestic fjord landscapes with tunnel walls.
But that appears to be the price Norway is willing to pay to speed up the journeys between Randaberg and Bokn which are separated by a 16-mile body of water.
Currently, the journey on the jagged coastal highway takes 21 hours by car and ferry, but the new tunnel built floating underwater and in the bedrock will shave 11 hours off it.
The 17-mile Rogfast tunnel consists of two dual-lane tunnel tubes (Picture: Norwegian public roads administration)
Work has been going on for the past seven years to get Rogfast ready to open by 2033.
The Rogfast tunnel comes with a whopping £1,600,000,000 bill – but Norway is not running out of petty cash any time soon.
The Nordic oil producer is the world’s seventh-richest country thanks to its huge oil and gas reserves in the North Sea.
A CGI visual showing what the floating underwater tunnel will look like (Picture: Norwegian public roads administration)
The record-breaking tunnel is part of a £36,000,000,000 improvement project of the E39 highway connecting Trondheim in the north and Kristiansand in the south, the Telegraph reports.
At its deepest, the tunnels will be excavated 1,300ft underground. Driving through it will take just 35 minutes.
However, a mega-project like this is not without its controversies.
A CGI visual showing how the tunnel will be built from the land at Randaberg towards Kvitsøy (Picture: Norwegian public roads administration)
The tunnel lies within an earthquake-prone area. No earthquake risk assessment was reportedly carried out before the construction started – despite Norway seeing the most activity of any country north of the Alps, according to the public broadcaster NRK.
The tunnel means locals and visitors will no longer rely solely on ferries to travel between Kvitsøy, Bokn and Randaberg.
But Ole Olsen, a local politician and the former mayor of Kvitsøy, said that while the 24h tunnel is welcome, it means the community loses ‘the social benefits the ferry provides,’ the NRK reported.