On May 11, 2023, the excavation of the shield working shaft of the Ningbo section of the Jintang Submarine Tunnel, the controlling project of the Yongzhou-Zhouzhou Railway, means that the Ningbo section of the world's longest submarine high-speed rail tunnel has fully started.

Jintang Submarine Tunnel

The Jintang Submarine Tunnel is located under the Jintang Waterway between Ningbo and Zhoushan. It starts from Beilun District of Ningbo in the west and ends at Jintang Town in Zhoushan in the east. It is 16.18 kilometers long. It is currently the most difficult and longest designed submarine high-speed rail tunnel in the world. It is nearly 10 kilometers longer than the cross-sea tunnel of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge. The excavation size of the shield working well in the Ningbo section is 22.6 meters long, 21.1 meters wide and 58.13 meters deep. It is currently the deepest shield starting working well in China.

According to reports, for the first time in the world's ultra-large-diameter shield tunneling construction, two shield tunneling machines are excavated in opposite directions, docked on the seabed, and then disassembled in the tunnel after docking. The Zhoushan section has entered the construction phase at the end of April.

The Ningbo-Zhou Railway starts from Ningbo East Station in the west, passes through Ningbo Yinzhou District, Beilun District, Jintang Island, Cezi Island, Fuchi Island in Zhoushan City, and Zhoushan Main Island. There are 7 stations. The main line is 76.4 kilometers long, of which the newly-built line is 70.1 kilometers long. , with a design speed of 250 kilometers per hour, is to build a one-hour traffic circle in Zhejiang Province and form a convenient passenger transport channel between the mainland and Zhoushan Island. After completion, the travel time from Ningbo to Zhoushan will be shortened from the current 1.5 hours to 26 minutes, and the travel time from Zhoushan to Hangzhou will be shortened from 3.5 hours to 77 minutes. Editor/He Yuting