On the morning of October 28

constructed by China Railway 14th Bureau Group

the Wuhan Heping Avenue South Extension Project officially opened to traffic

The shield tunnel has an excavation diameter of 16.03 meters

and is currently the largest single-tube double-deck urban road tunnel in China

The Heping Avenue South Extension Project is located in Wuchang District, Wuhan, connecting Heping Avenue to the north and Zhang Zhidong Road to the south, with a total length of 3,042.5 meters. The road is built in a "surface + tunnel" form, of which the tunnel is 2,190 meters long, with a single-tube double-deck dual-carriageway six-lane configuration and a design speed of 60 km/h, serving as the controlling project of the Wuchang river-following corridor.

Crossing an 1,800-year-old ancient city

Complex geological challenges present numerous difficulties

The tunnel passes through the 1,800-year-old Wuchang ancient city, along which are densely distributed more than 500 old buildings and several former residences of famous people. With the ancient city above and archaeological sites below, achieving both urban construction and the protection of historical remains in a mutually reinforcing way poses an extremely formidable challenge.

If encountering the millennia-old ancient city is an unavoidable test, then the challenge of complex geology is a hurdle that the tunnel builders must overcome.

The Heping Avenue South Extension Tunnel passes through 14 strata containing 7 types of rock, with 23 stratum transitions, strongly developed karst in the limestone section, and rock strength of up to 197 MPa in the quartz sandstone section, making it a veritable complex "geological maze."

First use of a single-tube double-deck dual-carriageway six-lane shield

Clearing the city's dead-end road

Faced with complex construction conditions, the project adopted for the first time a single-tube double-deck dual-carriageway six-lane shield cross-section, and innovatively adopted a cross-sectional design scheme in which the upper and lower decks share a common transverse smoke exhaust duct.

Rendering of the single-tube dual-carriageway six-lane configuration

During construction, experts including Academician Qian Qihu of the Chinese Academy of Engineering were invited to "review" the technical schemes on site, and the construction team of China Railway 14th Bureau Group applied automated monitoring construction technology to monitor settlement data in real time and adjust tunneling parameters accordingly.

The shield machine safely and smoothly passed beneath the Wuchang ancient city, the Beijing-Guangzhou Railway and several former residences of famous people. Through construction, innovative technologies were explored and summarized, with 3 invention patents and 12 utility model patents filed, and 2 papers published in national professional journals.

The full completion and opening of the Heping Avenue South Extension Project marks the clearing of a long-standing "dead-end road" today, allowing vehicles to travel directly from Sanma Road to Zhang Zhidong Road in 3 minutes. It will effectively ease traffic pressure from Zhongshan Road to Baishazhou Avenue, form a traffic backbone corridor in the river-following direction of Wuchang, and add another transportation artery to Wuhan's urban development. At the same time, the tunnel provides a successful case for protecting ancient city relics and scenic spots and for developing and utilizing underground space.