Webuild is in the final stages of preparing TBM ‘Mireille’ to start the excavation later this month of a 5.3km section of tunnel for metro Line 16 of the Grand Paris Express – currently Europe’s largest infrastructure project.

The TBM – a 9.87m-diameter EPBM supplied by China’s CREG – is the eighth to start working on the line, and will excavate between Bel-Air à Chelles and Mare au Chanvre. It will install fibre-reinforced concrete (FRC) segments to give Line 16 a ‘first’ in French construction history: other than a few temporary works, FRC has not seen major use before in France due mainly to a lack of regulations and a previous hiatus in tunnel projects.

Since the end of 2020, teams of the Webuild-NGE GC consortium have been assembling the TBM at the bottom of a 50m deep, 40m-diameter shaft at Bel Air. They installed the machine's cutterhead on 4 February. When the line is finally commissioned, the shaft will serve for ventilation and smoke extraction purposes, as well as for emergency access.

Line 16 is the second Grand Paris Express line on which Webuild is working. The first is a section of Line 14 South, on which it and its partner achieved a TBM breakthrough a few months earlier at the site of the future Pont de Rungis station in southern Paris.

Grand Paris Express will extend the French capital’s metro and light rail network by 200km and add 68 stations to improve connections between the centre and the periphery. It is expected to improve the local economy, create jobs, promote sustainable mobility and reduce vehicle traffic and air pollution.

For the original article, please visit Webuild preparing to launch Line 16 TBM - Tunnels & Tunnelling International (tunnelsonline.info).