- Deutschland
- Civil Engineering
- Earthworks
- Mobility
B247 FEDERAL ROAD, MÜHLHAUSEN
⧭ Mühlhausen, Germany
Concession granting authority: DEGES
Concession holder: Via Mühlhausen Thüringen
Contractor consortium: Eurovia Deutschland, VINCI Construction Terrassement Deutschland (a VINCI Construction GeoInfrastructure subsidiary in Germany)
The project
The B247 federal road will link Mühlhausen and Bad Langensalza, two towns in Thuringia, and the contract encompasses financing, designing and building the road then operating it for 30 years.
The solution
The new road will streamline travel in north-east Thuringia and smoothen access to the region’s motorway network. It will also improve road safety and improve quality of life in the area by retouring heavy vehicles: the new road will bypass three towns – Mühlhausen, Schönstedt and Grossengottern – which the existing road currently cuts through.
The challenge
Much of the soil along the new route was compressible, so we had to fine-tune and implement several soil improvement techniques to avoid subsidence during construction and after it, including preloading, vertical drains, controlled modulus columns and dynamic compaction. Factoring these highly elaborate geotechnical works into the construction schedule was a considerable challenge.
Human resources
We had to enlist a second team in Germany to start work on the B247 federal road while the first one completed the Stuttgart 21 project. This project, in other words, entailed hiring locally and is helping to structure our subsidiary in Germany. The aim is to carry out most of the work – earthworks, drainage and standard engineering structures – ourselves.
