On the morning of June 30, the construction site of the Yancheng–Yixing High-Speed Railway Yangtze River Tunnel in Jingjiang was bustling with activity as the Suti "Fenji" shield machine commenced excavation. The shield machine will bore 6,710 meters underground, crossing beneath the Yangtze River.

　　The Yancheng–Yixing High-Speed Railway Yangtze River Tunnel is a controlling project for the entire Yancheng–Yixing High-Speed Railway line. The tunnel connects Jingjiang City of Taizhou to the north and Jiangyin City of Wuxi to the south, with a total length of 8,130 meters. It adopts a single-tube double-track design with a designed speed of 250 km/h and is China's first high-speed railway shield tunnel to use socket-and-spigot segment lining, with a maximum burial depth of 71 meters.

　　"The domestically produced super-large-diameter shield machine Suti 'Fenji' deployed this time was tailor-made for the complex geological conditions of the Yangtze River Tunnel. The machine is approximately 145 meters long, weighs about 3,800 tons in total, and has an excavation diameter of 14.33 meters," introduced An Jichao, deputy chief mechanical engineer of the shield tunneling work area.

　　It is reported that the Yancheng–Yixing High-Speed Railway is a backbone line of Jiangsu's "six vertical and six horizontal" high-speed rail network and an important north-south connecting line of the national "eight vertical and eight horizontal" high-speed rail network. The main line has a total length of 311 kilometers, starting from Yancheng City in the north, passing through Taizhou City in the middle, crossing the Yangtze River natural barrier, and then passing through Wuxi City and Changzhou City before terminating at Yixing City.

　　At present, all sections of the pre-station works within Wuxi of the Yancheng–Yixing High-Speed Railway are under intensive construction. A total of more than 13,000 bridge pile foundations have been completed, approximately 820 pile caps have been poured, and nearly 260 pier shafts have been built. Once completed, this high-speed railway will promote deep integration among northern, central, and southern Jiangsu, help Wuxi upgrade from a node on the Shanghai–Nanjing corridor to a cross-river integration hub, further enhance the convenience of inter-regional travel, and make travel for citizens more efficient and smooth.

       Source: Wuxi New Media