Oosterweelverbinding, the transport infrastructure project of the “century” for the city of Antwerp

Antwerp is a very important hub for freight and passenger transport and faces extensive mobility challenges. To significantly reduce traffic congestions and accidents in the region, the project to build the Oosterweelverbinding became one of the major projects of the Masterplan 2020, launched by the Flemish government in the 1990s, with the aim of improving the accessibility of the Antwerp region. This project involves the construction of a direct link between Linkeroever, the port of Antwerp, het Eilandje, Merksem and the Noordersingel area in order to improve accessibility to the city and the port. To provide a good and safe transit route for freight traffic, this link has been designed over a length of about 15km and as an underground infrastructure to limit the impact of the construction works.

The Oosterweelverbinding project consists of numerous junctions between the existing tunnels, the reconstruction of the interchanges on the left bank of the region and the removal of dangerous access roads, while taking into account the requirements of an urban region in terms of environment, quality of life and spatial planning. For instance, the Scheldt tunnel goes underground between the nature conservation areas of Blokkersdijk and Sint-Annabos and has separate tubes for cyclists and pedestrians. This tunnel will be connected to the new Oosterweel junction on the right bank, to create an important intersection in the accessibility to the port of Antwerp and the northern part of the city. Other canal tunnels will be developed in double layer, cut-and-cover, consisting of 4 tubes, stacked two by two.

As the project owner of this design and construction, Lantis appointed Equans to look after all technical installations of the tunnels part of the Oosterweelverbinding. In its turn, Equans appointed Tractebel to undertake the engineering scope described hereabove.

While the expertise deployed on this project is based on core expertise of the Urban team of Tractebel, this particular project is unique by its dimensions. This requires the mobilization of close to 40 persons on a full time basis. A perfect coordination with all project stakeholders is therefore paramount for the success of this project