High Speed Florence: “In 2028 the first train at the Foster station” – Chronicle
Florence, 5 August 2022 – “The first train in Foster station, based on today’s timing based on the contract, and which can then be improved during construction and tender activities, will be able to stop in the first half of 2028”.
This is ensured by the Deputy Director General of Infrastructure of Italian railway network , Vincenzo Macello, at the end of an inspection of the sites of the high speed tunnel in the Florence node. The manager of the FS group assures that the respect of deadlines, an element of strong disagreement in recent days with Tuscany Region and Municipality of Florence this time there are robust guarantees: from the contracts already started with Herrenknecht, the company that takes care of the operation of the excavator, to the tender that will be published next Tuesday to entrust the work, up to the involvement of the group’s reality such as Infrarail and Italferr.
“This team and the contracts that start – he says – are certainly a very important way to really be able to get to the goal “. The commitment to complete the work, moreover, is confirmed by the fact that RFI has decided to self-finance the increase in expensive material:” It is a further guarantee – specifies the engineer Macello – that the company absolutely wants this ‘work, because in addition to the undoubted benefits that there will be speed for the trains in Alta, there will be incredible benefits in freeing Santa Maria Novella, thus managing to increase urban and regional trains “.
In the meantime, from 1 August it has been entrusted to Herrenknecht the task of disassembling, reconditioning, reassembling the cutter to make it fully functional. The disassembly of the shield will take place between mid-September and mid-December, while they will be reassembled by the end of March the various components . “There will then be a 15-day test phase – points out Macello – on March 30th it will be ready”. At that point, he concludes, once we have the necessary materials for the works in the gallery, “we can start making the so-called ashlars”.