The German leg of the access route to the Brenner Base Tunnel seems to be plagued by misfortune. Already significantly behind schedule, the German railways now face additional delays due to objections from local committees against the project's design from Munich to Austria. The Tyrolean daily, Tiroler Tageszeitung, reports that the 54-kilometer section between Grafing and Kufstein is particularly contentious. These objections are expected to further delay decisions on the project, which is valued at 8.7 billion euros and is increasingly seen as unlikely to be realized and completed by 2050, according to sources from the Bavarian Ministry of Transport.
The northern access route to the Brenner Base Tunnel (BBT) has never seemed to have fortune on its side. The overall route for the new high-capacity railway between Germany and Austria was only finalized in April 2021, after six years of arduous planning. The southernmost section of the new line from the German area of Rosenheim will reach the easternmost part of Austria's Inn valley. The chosen route, mostly in Germany, involves a series of tunnels accounting for 60% of the path. The variant starts at Ostermünchen in Germany, north of Rosenheim, and reaches Schaftenau in Austria (the northern portal of the ongoing construction sites).
In April 2022, the German railways DB began planning the alternative line to enhance the Rosenheim hub. A new line around the Bavarian city is to be constructed, featuring mainly two tunnels, along with a series of civil engineering structures to integrate the railway track. The Rosenheim area variant might be the only section with a potentially more favorable outcome as the fate of the complete quadrupling in Bavaria is yet to be determined, echoing the delays seen with the new Rhine corridor between Germany and Switzerland north of Basel, which is not expected to be completed before 2040.
In contrast, the Austrian railways had made significant progress: after completing the Innsbruck freight bypass in 1994, which includes a 12.7-kilometer tunnel (the longest in the country to date), in 2012, they opened a 40-kilometer section in the lower Inn valley from the northern entrance of the Innsbruck bypass to Radfeld-Kundl, just south of Wörgl. In 2023, the project advanced further operationally with the section between Radfeld and Schaftenau, just a few kilometers from Kufstein, at the border between Austria and Germany. Italy is also diligently progressing with its tasks, starting with the priority variant between Fortezza and Ponte Gardena, which has already been contracted and is underway.
Piermario Curti Sacchi
