ÖBB Wienerwaldtunnel

The Wienerwaldtunnel is the essential structure of the four-track expansion of the so-called Westbahn between Vienna and St. Pölten.

The new high capacity section was opened for scheduled trains with the introduction of a new time table valid from December 2012 .

By two single-track tubes with a length of 10.75 km each and cross-cuts every 500 m the travel time of the trains has been dramatically reduced. Between Salzburg and Vienna the regular travel time has been shortened to 2.5 hours, between Vienna and St. Pölten to 25 minutes. The tunnels are approved for a speed of 250 km/h. Test were conducted with top speeds up to 330 km/h.

The tunnel structure consists of the two long single-track tubes and a 2.4 km long double-track tube on the Viennese side of the Wienerwaldtunnel. The Eastern portal is located underground in a hall near Hadersdorf-Weidlingau which was constructed in advance. This hall connects the Wienerwaldtunnel and the Lainzer Tunnel through which the track continues to Vienna. The Western portal is located between Chorherrn (municipiality Tulbing) and Kleinstaasdorf south from Tulln. The track continues in direction to St. Pölten through the tunnel group Perschling.

For the incident or emergency ventilation smoke detectors have been installed in the junction area. The emergency ventilation will only run with maximum power after the smoke detectors in the junction area indicate smoke. Air flow monitoring systems to measure both air velocity and direction have been installed in the single-track tubes near the junction area and in the portal areas.

The Wienerwaldtunnel is part of the Trans European Network (TEN) for high speed trains. It is the longest railway tunnel in Austria.

Our work on behalf of ELIN GmbH & Co KG, Tunneltechnik Innsbruck who was the contractor of the ventilation and air conditioning part (Baulos WT4) in the Wienerwaldtunnel included:

• 3 Smoke detectors, scattered light (t/SMD)
• 8 Air flow monitoring systems (ultrasonic) (t/FL-US)