The Longest Underwater Tunnel in the World

Brief 

Spanning eighteen kilometers, the new Fehrman Belt fixed link between Germany and Denmark is set to be the longest and fastest underwater tunnel in the world.

Insight

Spanning eighteen kilometers, the new Fehrman Belt fixed link between Germany and Denmark is set to be the longest and fastest underwater tunnel in the world. When completed, it will cut travel time down to ten minutes by car and seven minutes by train from Rødbyhavn to Puttgarden, a crossing that now takes forty-five minutes by ferry.

Once completed, the tunnel promises to reduce travel time, strengthen ties between Scandinavia and Central Europe, form a greener traffic lane, and boost train transport. The ten billion euro price tag, therefore, promises to be worth it and has the stamp of approval from the European Commission’s Ten-T Programme.

The underwater fixed link tunnel will consist of two two-lane highways divided by a service passage and two separate railways.

“Today, if you were to take a train trip from Copenhagen to Hamburg, it would take you around four and a half hours,” says the technical director at Jens Ole Kaslund, Femern A/S, the state-owned Danish company in charge of the project. “When the tunnel will be completed, the same journey will take two and a half hours.

The Fehrman Belt Fixed Link Project

Femern A/S laid foundations for the fixed link concept back in 2008, but it took another twelve years before the first ground breaking ceremony occurred in 2020 in Denmark and then in 2021 in Germany. Initial site preparation began at Rødbyhavn on Lolland and Puttgarden on the island of Fehrman. In 2021, the company established new channels and access roads, as well.

The company also set out to create work harbors and dredge the Fehmarn Belt to establish new land areas. They have also built a new, so-called tunnel town to go with the “tunnel factory” so to say, where the necessary elements for the Fixed Link project may be constructed.