Ulriken Tunnel

For the proposed road tunnel, see Arna Tunnel.

Ulriken Tunnel

Entrance from Arna Station
Interactive map of Ulriken Tunnel
Overview
Line	Bergen Line
Location	Bergen Municipality, Norway
Status	In use
System	Norwegian railway
Start	Arna Station
End	Bergen Station
Operation
Opened	1964
Owner	Bane NOR
Operator	Vy Tog CargoNet
Technical
Line length	7,670 metres (4.8 mi)
No. of tracks	Double track
Track gauge	1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in)
Electrified	15 kV  16.7 Hz AC
Operating speed	New Tunnel: 160 km/h (100 mph) Old Tunnel: 130 km/h (81 mph)

The Ulriken Tunnel (Norwegian : Ulrikstunnelen) is a double-track railway tunnel on the Bergen Line between Bergen Station and Arna Station in Bergen Municipality in Vestland county, Norway.

Original (old) tunnel

The existing 7,670-meter (25,160 ft) long tunnel runs under the northern part of the mountain Ulriken in Bergen Municipality. Before the tunnel was opened in 1964, the Bergen Line ran via Nesttun. This stretch is now a heritage railway, the Old Voss Line. The tunnel has single track and is electrified.

New tunnel

The Norwegian National Rail Administration has plans for building a second tunnel through the mountain. ^[1] Work on boring the 7.7 km (4.8 mi) tunnel began in January 2016 and it is the first in Norway to use a tunnel boring machine. On August 29, 2017 infrastructure manager Bane Nor and contractors Strabag and Skanska successfully completed the boring of the new tunnel. The next step was to cut out 16 crossings between the new and old tunnels, and to make the tunnel ready for use by railway traffic. The new double-track tunnel ^[2] was opened in December 2020. ^[3]

References

1. Aagesen, Ragnhild (21 September 2010). "Bergen-Arna" (in Norwegian). Archived from the original on 6 November 2011. Retrieved 20 September 2011.
2. Smith, Kevin. "Norway celebrates Ulriken tunnel breakthrough" . Retrieved 2017-09-04.
3. "Northern Europe's busiest single-track railway tunnel gets upgrade".

60°23′49″N5°24′43″E / 60.397°N 5.412°E / 60.397; 5.412