Three tunnels form the Perschling Tunnel Chain: Stierschweifeld Tunnel (3,293m), Reisenberg Tunnel (1,307m) and Raingruben Tunnel (2,775m). The Perschling Tunnel Chain is part of the Austrian Western Railway ("Westbahn") between Vienna and Salzburg and Passau (Germany) respectively that will be an important railway link between Middle and Eastern Europe from Paris to Budapest. The first sections of the Westbahn had already been built around 1850. The Perschling Tunnel Chain implements the much needed modernization of the Westbahn for high-speed traffic.
Since December 2005 bored and built the Single Shield TBM by Herrenknecht the first of the three double-track Perschling tunnels through marl, siltstone and sandstone. In April 2007, the S-319 had the first breakthrough at the Stierschweiffeld Tunnel and, thus, successfully completed the first leg. Following the scheduled refurbishment in summer 2007, the machine attacked the Reisenberg Tunnel where successfull breakthrough was reached in February 2008. On the final leg, the Raingruben Tunnel, the crews on the jobsite finished mechanized tunnelling with the Herrenknecht Single Shield TBM S-319 in March 2009. The new line Wien - St. Pölten was opened for traffic on December 9, 2012.
The Perschling Tunnel Chain (German)