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| RAIL PROFESSIONAL INTERVIEW
a discussion with my partner where we discussed this very question and wanted to publish an answer – why are we so enthusiastic about HS2 for example? So, instead of being technical, we looked at the potential effect of Crossrail once it is open – things like the value of property but also the reduction in travel time for commuters, which should improve their wellbeing, for some people it cuts their travel time in half. You’ve worked on Crossrail and on HS2, the Western Rail Link to Heathrow Airport as well. What improvements in sustainability have been made in these more recent projects? We have improved the durability of the materials and we have tighter quality control, more protection measures like waterproofing so we can prevent the groundwater from flowing into the structure. Structures today probably have 50 to 100 per cent longer lifetimes than traditional structures. There’s always a discussion about the impact on the environment in any of these projects, for quite some time we ignored the environment when we built infrastructure. Anything we do has an effect on the environment and on our surroundings, but we can reduce the negative effects.
We haven’t really seen a quantum leap, because the industry is relatively conservative, so progress is slow. For a long time grouting the ground was a generic solution for almost everything, whereas today we are much more efficient with the use of grout and due to the TBM technology, we use much less grout. When I look at HS2, our involvement is as a designer for the C1 project, the Chiltern Tunnel, and nearby there is a water extraction field which has a lot of pumps extracting drinking water and there was a long discussion about avoiding polluting the groundwater, which could then affect the pump fields. In the past, it would just be accepted that we had to build it so we have to risk doing this harm, but now the mindset
has changed about the use of materials, and the use of natural resources as well, so we focus on engineering a solution. Our work in the Chilterns is focussed on designing the 38 cross passages and the portal where the TBM started where we came up with a support system in the portal area to avoid settlements. Do you think that a tunnel under the Irish Sea linking to Scotland and Northern Ireland feasible? Absolutely, yes it would be technically feasible, you would probably have to build islands in between where you can have escape shafts and ventilation shafts. Whether financially and economically, it makes sense is a different story, which to be honest, I can’t answer, if you look at the Eurotunnel, it makes much more sense to use that then flying from London to Paris, and there are plans for tunnel projects between Denmark and Sweden, I believe. For the future of tunnelling, we have to bring down the costs and the time spent on the project, and those are interconnected of course. We need to develop technologies which can increase the speed of tunnelling and reduce the costs of it. We also have to reduce the time involved with general planning, Crossrail is an example, I was personally involved in Crossrail in 1991, and I was there in 2012 when it finally started construction.
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