Or the Fehmarn Belt tunnel (northern Germany to Denmark).
Or probably most of those big infrastructure construction projects.
Or the Fehmarn Belt tunnel (northern Germany to Denmark).
Or probably most of those big infrastructure construction projects.
Not sure why you added the Fehmarn Belt tunnel, there are no rumors or news of being mismanaged or going over the budget or being behind schedule.
https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/fehmarnbelt-delayed-...
> Sund & Bælt, the Danish transport company overseeing the project, has now confirmed that IVY has not yet completed full testing and has not received final approvals from relevant authorities, despite arriving on site last October. The preparatory delay is about 18 months, a setback that project managers say makes meeting the original 2029 opening target difficult.
> There is also an issue with restrictions around the working conditions. Contracts for the main construction works were signed in 2016, before German planning approval had been granted. That timing meant certain later-imposed requirements – notably restrictions on underwater noise from work vessels and limits on sediment spill in German waters – were not written into the original contracts, complicating attempts to speed up work now that the rules are in place.
Over budget, decades behind schedule because Germany does everything to rise costs and delay. First they sunk the bridge project, now they delay the tunnel project. See the Wikipedia page.
Hadn’t they designed a bridge, they were getting ready to build it, and it was changed to a tunnel.
It does make sense since tunnels won’t need to closed for high winds like bridges do.
I might have misremembered bits of this.
You're describing a perfectly normal and healthy development arc.
An initial study into a problem poses a preferred solution.
Time and effort is put into deep study of the solution path. Unfortunately, in this case the study proves it is far less ideal than initially assumed.
The project is switched to Plan B.
Granted, sometimes this kind of early change in direction is for dumb or dishonest reasons, but one cannot perfectly know the results before the studies are completed.
I am in rail design. We are currently designing things for needs in 2030-2060. The world is complicated.
At least this one is getting built, similar to the Brenner Base Tunnel in the South - the common thing tying both projects together is Deutsche Bahn, the federal parliament and the local parliaments being unable to get their asses together and expand the regional tracks to be able to carry the extended traffic that both these tunnels enable.
But is Germany even deeply involved there? I thought construction was split between AT and IT.
The BBT itself, no that's indeed (thank God) not handled by DB.
But the BBT also needs supporting infrastructure from Kufstein to Munich, the so called Brenner Nordzulauf [1], some of which (the Truderinger Spange) is also covered by the Ausbaustrecke 38 programme [2]. Unfortunately, the Brenner Nordzulauf has been hotly contested [3] with very good points being raised - among others, some of the route proposals run through nature protection reservates, people are skeptical of years worth of construction, noise, debris, rail and road blocks, and separation of entire areas by another rail track.
[1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brenner-Nordzulauf
[2] https://www.bahnausbau-muenchen.de/projekt.html?PID=29
[3] https://www.sueddeutsche.de/muenchen/ebersberg/brenner-basis...
And Berlin Airport
And the Edinburgh Tram Project
Future:
- Heathrow Third Runway (assuming the government meddle in it heavily)
- Lower Thames Crossing
The initial phase of the Edinburgh Trams project wasn't great - but I suspect everyone involved knew it was going to be difficult and it's the approach of getting the project started and once started it's difficult to kill (see Robert Moses for that strategy!).
However, it's now a good service, popular and the trams are probably going to be expanded to much more of the city?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edinburgh_Trams
Also the Queensferry Crossing bridge was built with relatively little fuss - there were some delays but those were down to some spells of very bad weather.
As a taxpayer, I can't stomach such acceptance of incompetence and mismanagement and corruption in the UK, personally.
It was a "litany of avoidable failures" as the Hardie report explained.
It does look like a tremendous success now though (not financially though. A double whammy for the taxpayer). The ends justify the means I guess?
Indeed, I wasn't trying to defend the management of the trams project - which did seem a farce.
Mind you - the investigation into the trams itself took far longer than expected and cost far more than anyone thought it should...
> the investigation into the trams itself took far longer than expected and cost far more than anyone thought it should
It's like the dessert coming out after the buffet! Doubles all round!