The Fréjus Road Tunnel (, ) is a

tunnel A tunnel is an underground or undersea passageway. It is dug through surrounding soil, earth or rock, or laid under water, and is usually completely enclosed except for the two portals common at each end, though there may be access and ve ...

that connects

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

and

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

. It runs under Col du Fréjus in the

Cottian Alps The Cottian Alps (; ; ) are a mountain range in the southwestern part of the Alps. They form the border between France (Hautes-Alpes and Savoie) and Italy (Piedmont). The Fréjus Road Tunnel and Fréjus Rail Tunnel between Modane and Susa, Ital ...

between

Modane Modane (; ) is a Communes of France, commune in the Savoie Departments of France, department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Regions of France, region in southeastern France. The commune is in the Maurienne Valley, and it also belongs to the Vanoise ...

in France and

Bardonecchia Bardonecchia (; ; , ) is an Italian town and ''comune'' located in the Metropolitan City of Turin, in the Piedmont region, in the western part of Susa Valley. It grew out of a small village with the works for the Fréjus Rail Tunnel, the first c ...

in Italy. It is one of the major trans-Alpine transport routes between France and Italy being used for 80% of the commercial road traffic. Construction of the long tunnel started in 1974, and it came into service on 12 July 1980, leading to the closure of the motorail shuttle service in the

Fréjus rail tunnel The Fréjus Rail Tunnel (also called Mont Cenis Tunnel) is a rail tunnel of length in the European Alps, carrying the Turin–Modane railway through Mont Cenis to an end-on connection with the Culoz–Modane railway and linking Bardonecc ...

. It cost 2 billion

francs The franc is any of various units of currency. One franc is typically divided into 100 centimes. The name is said to derive from the Latin inscription ''francorum rex'' ( King of the Franks) used on early French coins and until the 18th centur ...

(equivalent to €700 million at 2005 prices). It is the thirteenth longest road tunnel in the world and the longest road tunnel that crosses an international border. The French section is managed by the French company SFTRF, and the Italian section by the Italian company SITAF. (The French politician Pierre Dumas was chairman of SFTRF from 1962 to 1989). The tunnel can be reached from the Italian side by the A32

Torino Turin ( , ; ; , then ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital from 1861 to 1865. The city is main ...

-Bardonecchia motorway, or by SS335 from

Oulx Oulx (, , ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Turin in the Italian region Piedmont, located about west of Turin, in the Susa Valley on the border with France. Names Like many other towns in the Susa Valley, Oulx has diff ...

, which joins SS24 (“del Monginevro”), and reaches Bardonecchia after . From the French side, it can be reached by the A43 (“l’Autoroute de la Maurienne”) from

Lyon Lyon (Franco-Provençal: ''Liyon'') is a city in France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of the French Alps, southeast of Paris, north of Marseille, southwest of Geneva, Switzerland, north ...

and

Chambéry Chambéry (, , ; Franco-Provençal, Arpitan: ''Chambèri'') is the Prefectures in France, prefecture and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of the Savoie Departments of France, department in the southeastern ...

. A toll is charged to all traffic.

Safety

Following a major fire in the Mont Blanc tunnel in 1999, measures were taken at the start of 2000 to improve safety in the tunnel. A strict speed limit, and a safe distance of between vehicles was imposed. The tunnel was equipped with the latest smoke and flame detectors, and a system of videocameras in the tunnel to detect the speed of traffic, as well as fire and smoke. Temperature sensors were installed at short distances throughout the tunnel, monitored from a central control post. Fire hydrants were installed every 130 m, fed from large water tanks. There are 11 safety points along the tunnel, equipped with telephones and loud speakers connected to the control room, with a separate ventilation duct to supply fresh air. These are separated from the main tunnel by two fire doors; the outer door closes automatically when the temperature in the tunnel reaches a certain level. Finally there is a ‘thermal gate’ system at each entrance to identify any overheating vehicles. Despite these measures, on 4 June 2005, a fire caused the death of two Slovak lorry drivers, and the closure of the tunnel to traffic for several weeks. It reopened to cars on 4 August 2005, and later to commercial vehicles. The tunnel was also briefly closed due to non-fatal fires on 9 January 2007, 29 November 2010, and 10 April 2014. A second bore, parallel to the existing one at a distance of , is under construction. Work began in 2009, following EU regulations put in place after the Mont Blanc Tunnel fire. Originally planned as an wide rescue tunnel, an agreement was reached in 2012 to open the new bore to traffic towards France while converting one lane of the existing bore into an emergency lane. The breakthrough occurred on 17 November 2014. The new bore is due to open to traffic in the autumn of 2023. As there will still be a single lane for each direction (the other lane being an emergency lane), the capacity of the tunnel will remain unchanged. Both bores will be connected by a series of passages, five of which can be used by emergency vehicles. The firefighting team consists of four intervention teams: positioned on the Italian and French sides, and two inside the tunnel, about from each end.

Fréjus Underground Laboratory

Near the midpoint is the Laboratoire Souterrain de Modane (also referred to as the Fréjus Underground Laboratory). This site houses the Neutrino Ettore Majorana Observatory (NEMO experiment), an international collaboration of scientists searching for

neutrinoless double beta decay Neutrinoless double beta decay (0νββ) is a commonly proposed and experimentally pursued theoretical radioactive decay process that would prove a Majorana particle, Majorana nature of the neutrino particle. To this day, it has not been found. ...

. An observation of neutrinoless double beta decay would be evidence that

neutrino A neutrino ( ; denoted by the Greek letter ) is an elementary particle that interacts via the weak interaction and gravity. The neutrino is so named because it is electrically neutral and because its rest mass is so small ('' -ino'') that i ...

s are

Majorana particle In particle physics a Majorana fermion (, uploaded 19 April 2013, retrieved 5 October 2014; and also based on Ettore Majorana, the pronunciation of physicist's name.) or Majorana particle is a fermion that is its own antiparticle. They were hyp ...

s and could be used to measure the neutrino mass. Attempts are underway to build a larger laboratory, either in the same tunnel or in the even deeper Lyon Turin Ferroviaire 15 km to the east.Project of a Large International Underground Laboratory at Fréjus
/ref>

References

External links

Homepage
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Frejus Road Tunnel Tunnels in the Alps Road tunnels in France Road tunnels in Italy Cross-border roads Transport in Piedmont Toll tunnels in Europe France–Italy border crossings Tunnels completed in 1980 International tunnels 1980 establishments in France 1980 establishments in Italy Bardonecchia