This article is from page 16 of the 2008-07-22 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 16 JPG
A QUICK preview of life under the river Shannon as it will be in 2010 will go on display this Saturday, as the general public are invited to a once in a lifetime opportunity to see the Limerick tunnel before it is bur- ied under water.
The open day will run from 10am to 4pm with visitors asked to gather
in the Shannon Rugby Club in Coon- agh. The contractors DirectRoute will provide an information centre with a scale model of the scheme and will operate a pick and drop bus tour from the rugby ground carpark.
The guided bus tour will take visi- tors around the casting basin for a close-up view of the tunnel and as- sociated site works.
Following two years of design, five
immersed tube tunnel elements are currently being fitted out for the next major phase of the tunnel construc- tion – immersion in a pre-dredged channel.
The Limerick tunnel is part of the final phase of the Limerick South- ern Ring Road. This phase starts at the Rossbrien Roundabout on the N7 and continues westward along six kilometres of dual-lane dual car-
rlageway crossing Greenfields Road, St Nessans Road, the Dock Road and Bunlicky Lake before diving under the Shannon through 915m of tunnel and emerging at Coonagh.
The route continues north west for another four kilometres before con- necting with the N18 to Ennis.
The road also includes 11 bridges, six underpasses and two toll plazas. while each tunnel element is approx- imately 100 metres long or the length of a football pitch.
It is as high as a two-storey house (8.5m), wide enough for two lanes of traffic in each direction (25m) and weighs in at 20,000 tonnes, giv- ing a staggering combined weight of 100,000 tonnes.
This massive piece of infrastruc- ture is too big for any modern crane to move so modern engineers have been forced to look to the builders of the pyramids and Stonehenge.
DirectRoute will first flood the cast- ing basin in late August to float the tunnel elements. The 100,000 tonne tunnel elements will then be floated out and immersed beneath the river in a pre-dredged channel.
According to General Manager of Direct Route Tom King this Saturday is the perfect chance for the public to see this marvel of modern engineer- ing before it is buried beneath the longest river in Ireland.