Constructors from China Railway No.4 Engineering Group Co., Ltd (CREC4) have finished digging a key mountain tunnel for the Laixi-Rongcheng high-speed railway in Shandong Province after a busy job of 652 days, laying a solid foundation for the subsequent construction.
The 6,058-meter-long Yuhuang (Jade Emperor) Mountain Tunnel, being built by CREC4 Seventh Engineering Co., Ltd as the longest railway tunnel under construction in Shandong, was fully connected on November 15.
The Laixi-Rongcheng high-speed railway is an extension of the Qingdao-Yinchuan transport corridor — one of China’s “eight vertical and eight horizontal” HSR network that links Qingdao in Shandong with Yinchuan in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, as well as a main channel for passenger transport in the Jiaodong Peninsula area.
With a main line of 192.814 kilometers long and a designed speed of 350 kilometers per hour for the trains, the Laixi-Rongcheng HSR has seven stations, including the Laixi Station, Laiyang South Station, Haiyang Station, Rushan South Station, Weihai Nanhai Station, Wendeng South Station and Rongcheng Station. The Laixi-Rongcheng HSR starts at Laixi Station in the west, and after passing through the cities of Qingdao, Yandao and Weihai, enters the existing Rongcheng Station.
It has been learned that the Yuhuang Mountain Tunnel, dug with a method in rock excavation through drilling and blasting, has high safety risk and is complex in construction as well as difficult in technology. The CREC4 builders followed scientific methods and stringent work procedures, successfully ending all the digging task.
To date, the construction of subgrade and bridge substructure has all been completed for the Laixi-Rongcheng HSR, with all the tunnels connected and the erection of all box girders on the two-way railway tracks finished. Construction on the ballastless tracks, station buildings and supporting facilities is also progressing smoothly.
As a main channel for passenger transport in Shandong’s Jiaodong Peninsula area, the Laixi-Rongcheng HSR will help create a one-hour transport network in the peninsula, a two-hour transport network in the whole province, as a four-hour transport network linking Beijing, the national capital, thus largely facilitating residents’ travel.