Stuttgart 21 – a Pan-European Railway Project

Es­tab­lished in 1850, the railway con­nec­tion between Stuttgart and Ulm is no longer up to the demands placed upon it by the requirements of modern railway service. This section is part of the European high-speed railway route from Paris to Budapest via Stras­bourg, Stuttgart, Munich, Vienna, and Bratislava. The Deutsche Bahn AG railway company, Baden-Würt­tem­berg state, regional traffic au­thor­ity and Stuttgart city council, the German federal gov­ern­ment and the European Union are cur­rently im­ple­ment­ing one of the most in­no­v­a­tive and com­pre­hen­sive railway projects in Europe, including 60 km of new per­ma­nent railway from Stuttgart to Ulm as well as the con­ver­sion of Stuttgart’s main station from a terminus to an un­der­ground transit station. Named Stuttgart 21, the project has a total in­vest­ment of around € 6 billion, and is cur­rently one of the world’s most de­mand­ing in­fra­struc­ture projects.

A tunnel will connect the new underground transit station in the heart of Stuttgart to the airport and planned high-speed railway to Ulm with entry tunnels, some in open construction, as well as railway and road overpasses, trough structures, niches, new track and other engineering structures. The ring track underneath the city will substantially cut journey times for passengers. Commissioning of the Stuttgart-Ulm rail project is planned for the end of 2025.

Our clients com­mis­sioned us with building as­sess­ment and ge­ot­ech­ni­cal con­sult­ing through­out the city of Stuttgart in six planned approval stages through­out the ten­der­ing and con­struc­tion phases in the project. Ad­di­tional services include par­tic­i­pa­tion in the de­ter­mi­na­tion and eval­u­a­tion of con­struc­tive so­lu­tions, quality as­sur­ance of tenders, support for the awarding of con­tracts, prepa­ra­tion of subsoil and foun­da­tion reports as well as the prepa­ra­tion of ge­ot­ech­ni­cal and hy­dro­ge­o­log­i­cal risk and mal­func­tion analysis. The services also include the client’s ge­ot­ech­ni­cal con­sult­ing re­gard­ing legally secured pro­ce­dures as well as the the spe­cialised site su­per­vi­sion and the assessment of the subsoil. 

The con­struc­tion man­age­ment re­quire­ments for urban con­struc­tion stages make this major project es­pe­cially in­trigu­ing given the tight schedule and the highly complex regional ge­o­log­i­cal and hy­dro­ge­o­log­i­cal sit­u­a­tion. We are using our ex­pe­ri­ence in similar in­fra­struc­ture projects together with our ex­ten­sive knowl­edge of ge­ot­ech­ni­cal project prepa­ra­tion in the semi-hard rocks of the region. With our spe­cial­ist ex­per­tise we are making a valuable con­tri­bu­tion to the success of this project.