Portal:Trains/Selected article/Week 41, 2010

The Gotthard Base Tunnel (GBT) is a CHF 9.83 billion railway tunnel under construction in Switzerland. With a length of 57 km and a total of 151.84 km of tunnels, shafts and passages, it will be the world's longest tunnel (of all railway tunnels) on completion, surpassing the record holder, the Seikan Tunnel (connecting the Japanese islands of Honshū and Hokkaidō). The project has two tunnels with one track each. GBT is part of the Swiss AlpTransit project, also known as New Railway Link through the Alps (NRLA) which includes the Lötschberg Base Tunnel between the cantons of Berne and Valais. Like the Lötschberg tunnel, it will bypass winding mountain routes and establish a direct route suitable for high-speed rail and heavy freight trains. When completed, it should decrease the 3.5 hours travel time from Zürich to Milan by an hour and from Zürich to Lugano to 1 hour 40 minutes. The two portals are near the villages of Erstfeld, Canton Uri and Bodio, Canton Ticino. Completion is projected for late 2017. Nearby are two more St. Gotthard Tunnels: the 1881 Gotthard Rail Tunnel and the 1980 Gotthard Road Tunnel.