The Prague Public Transit Company continues to construct the fourth line of the Prague metro, known as Metro D. Currently, 1.6 kilometers of tunnels have been excavated. The first 520 meters of tunnels were created during geological exploration, and the remaining 1,082 meters were excavated from the start of construction.
The Prague Public Transit Company invested nearly 1.8 billion CZK into constructing Metro D last year and this year. Tunneling on the first section of Metro D will continue for almost three more years until around 2025 and 2026.
Since the construction, the contractor has dug a base tunnel from the initially conducted geological survey that continued from the Pankrác station but also carried out complete rock injections. In the inter-station section, where a double-track tunnel is being excavated, the excavation has advanced from the mine shaft almost to the future Olbrachtova station, about 420 meters away from the main mine shaft. Nearly 700 meters of the tunnel have been excavated in the inter-station section.
According to the Prague Public Transit Company, only 27 meters of excavation remain before the connected Pankrác and Olbrachtova stations. Before the excavation of the Olbrachtova station began, many engineering networks needed to be relocated, including optical cables, sewage, and water pipelines.
In total, 5,000 meters of engineering networks were relocated. An additional 5,000 meters still need to be relocated in the future southern vestibule area, where work currently requires a road closure on Na Strži Street.
A noise barrier has been constructed at the northern vestibule, behind which a crane stands that is currently hauling excavated material to the surface. At the same time, the material is transported to the bottom of the shaft. The contractor plans to begin mining the southern vestibule in the middle of this year.
“It will take just under three more years to excavate, and in total, we still have at least the same amount of tunneling left, but mainly the excavation of both stations and the digging of their vestibules,” said Petr Witowski, the director of the Prague Public Transit Company, on the construction site.