Huguenot Tunnel
The Huguenot Tunnel is a toll tunnel near Cape Town, South Africa. It extends the N1 national road through the Du Toitskloof mountains that separate Paarl from Worcester, providing a route that is safer, faster (between 15 and 26 minutes) and shorter (by 11 km) than the old Du Toitskloof Pass travelling over the mountain.
Geological surveys and design started in 1973, and excavation followed in 1984, tunneling from both ends using drilling and blasting. The two drilling heads met with an error of only 3 mm over its entire 3.9 km length. The tunnel was finally opened on 18 March 1988.
Currently the tunnel carries one lane of traffic in each direction. Plans are underway to open a second unfinished tunnel, the "northern bore", to carry eastbound traffic. This will allow for two lanes of traffic in each direction, with each tunnel carrying traffic in one direction only.[1][2]
In 2002, traffic peaks occurred during Easter (a record on 26 April 18 200 vehicles) and the December school holidays (12 000 vehicles per day).
The tunnel is maintained by Tolcon, a subsidiary of the Murray & Roberts construction company.[3]
The tunnel was constructed by Hochtief Construction AG and Concor Holdings.
The toll as proclaimed on 7 March 2013[4] was (in South African Rand):
- Light Vehicles: R 35.50
- 2-axle heavy vehicles: R 93.00
- 3 and 4-axle heavy vehicles: R 148.00
- 5 and more-axle heavy vehicles: R 236.00
The tunnel has 13 video cameras that feed into an automatic incident detection system, which can sound alarm devices for any of the following conditions:
- Stopped vehicles
- Fast and slow-moving traffic
- Traffic queues
- Wrong-way driving
Sources
- ↑ Powell, Anel (8 September 2008). "Second tunnel for W Cape road link". Cape Times. Independent Newspapers. p. 1. Retrieved 11 August 2009.
- ↑ "Transport master plan may cost R750bn". Business Day. 5 May 2010. Retrieved 5 May 2010.
- ↑ "Tolcon". Murray & Roberts. Retrieved 23 July 2010.
- ↑ "N1 Toll Fees". SANRAL. Retrieved 20 March 2013.
External links
Coordinates: 33°44′2″S 19°5′47″E / 33.73389°S 19.09639°E