Phase I of Hangzhou Metro Line 18 spans Xiaoshan District, Binjiang District, Shangcheng District, and Linping District of Hangzhou, with a total length of approximately 48.3 kilometers and 19 stations. It is a north-south rapid transit line crossing the central urban area. Among these, STEC Shanghai Tunnel Engineering undertook the construction task of the "one station, two sections" for Line 18 Section 4.

The section from Xiangbin Road Station to Baimahu Station, where the shield was launched this time, has a total length of 2 kilometers and an excavation diameter of 7.17 meters, making it one of the sections with the most complex geological structures and greater engineering difficulty along the entire line. During construction, STEC workers not only had to steer the shield through "soft on top, hard below" strata multiple times, crossing mountains and rivers, overcoming challenges such as difficult shield attitude control, difficult settlement control, and high strength of moderately weathered rock layers, but also had to directly confront complex karst geology during the construction of the shield receiving shaft, achieving precise breakthrough with superb technology.

At present, the STEC Shanghai Tunnel Engineering project team has organized all parties to discuss the construction plan. They will fill karst caves, fissures, and pores through precise grouting to provide favorable conditions for the trenching construction of the foundation pit; at the same time, they are preparing responses to potential difficulties such as high tool wear and frequent chamber openings for tool changes, so that the shield tunneling construction can proceed "calmly and unhurriedly."

After the project is completed, it will enable residents along the line to reach the city center more quickly, realize rapid connections between the north and south wings of Hangzhou and the central urban area, and jointly form the basic skeleton of Hangzhou's urban express lines together with lines such as Line 19.

Recently, the main structure of Fangle Road Station on the SFQSG-15 Section of the Shanghai Demonstration Zone Line, constructed by STEC Municipal Group, completed base sealing. The main structure of Fangle Road Station is divided into 4 work zones, making it the first underground station on the entire Demonstration Zone Line to complete base sealing of the entire main structure.

During construction, STEC Municipal Group empowered project construction with digital technology and innovative processes. In terms of digital technology, the project team independently innovated a "smart brain," creating a digital management and control platform for diaphragm walls that visually presents diaphragm wall construction information and records parameters of each process in real time, enabling real-time monitoring. During construction, through comparative analysis of key parameters such as trenching time, slurry replacement time, and reinforcement cage lifting time, problems in the construction process were discovered in a timely manner, greatly improving the precision of construction process control.

In terms of innovative processes, the project team conducted in-depth research on the application of fully hydraulic visual and controllable rotary drilling belled uplift pile technology. The belled uplift piles are constructed using the AM method, which offers the advantage of visual construction, allowing operators to monitor the construction process in real time. In project practice, the pile formation results were good, the verticality met the high standard requirement of 1/500, and all indicators of the pile holes performed excellently. In addition, the project team also innovatively applied processes such as air-lift dewatering, effectively improving construction safety, energy efficiency, and automation.

Recently, the jacking construction of the 23rd span steel box girder of the mainline bridge of the TJ12 Section of the Wuxi Tongjiang Avenue Rapid Reconstruction Phase I (Zhanjiang Interchange–Wangjiang Interchange) project, undertaken by STEC Shanghai Road & Bridge, was successfully completed in place, providing strong support for the full-line breakthrough of the project. The Tongjiang Avenue rapid reconstruction project is a key link connecting Wuxi's urban area with the expressway network, with a total length of approximately 3.6 kilometers. Upon completion, it will achieve "getting on the elevated road right after exiting the expressway," directly connecting to the urban expressway network and boosting coordinated regional development.

The TJ12 Section is located in Xishan District and mainly includes one mainline elevated bridge, six Wangjiang Interchange ramp bridges, three ground bridges and culverts, as well as pipeline engineering and road engineering. Among these, the 23rd span steel box girder of the mainline is truly the "hard nut" of the entire section, given its special location—with 220 kV high-voltage lines hanging low above and the busy National Highway 312 with heavy traffic below, creating a complex construction environment of "high voltage above, traffic below."

Facing numerous difficulties, the STEC Shanghai Road & Bridge project team planned ahead. During the jacking preparation stage, they invited technical experts to review and revise the jacking plan layer by layer, providing theoretical support for construction. At the same time, they strictly inspected relevant data such as the stability of the jacking supports, the performance of jacking equipment, and the dimensions of bearing beams and blocks, and precisely rechecked the axis and elevation of the jacking supports to ensure that all construction preparation conditions met safety requirements. During the jacking process, parameters such as deviation, deflection, and stress of the steel box girder were monitored in real time to ensure that every operation was precise, error-free, and safely controllable. After nine days and nights of intense work in high temperatures, the steel box girder was successfully jacked approximately 90 meters to the designed bridge position, completing a key milestone.

At present, the project has entered the final sprint toward the National Day milestone of "opening the G42 Expressway Wuxi Toll Station and opening the mainline ground road from north of National Highway 312 to the Wuxi Toll Station." The project team will continue to maintain high morale, striving to achieve full-line breakthrough of the project as soon as possible and create an efficient, convenient, and safe transportation artery for the people of Wuxi.