The Helsinki-to-Tallinn Tunnel is a proposed

undersea tunnel An underwater tunnel is a tunnel which is partly or wholly constructed under the sea or a river. They are often used where building a bridge or operating a ferry link is unviable, or to provide competition or relief for existing bridges or ferry li ...

that would span the

Gulf of Finland The Gulf of Finland ( fi, Suomenlahti; et, Soome laht; rus, Фи́нский зали́в, r=Finskiy zaliv, p=ˈfʲinskʲɪj zɐˈlʲif; sv, Finska viken) is the easternmost arm of the Baltic Sea. It extends between Finland to the north and E ...

and connect the

Finnish Finnish may refer to: * Something or someone from, or related to Finland * Culture of Finland * Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland * Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people * Finnish cuisine See also ...

and

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

n capitals by train. The tunnel's length would depend upon the route taken: the shortest distance across would have a submarine length of , which would make it the longest undersea tunnel in the world (both the

Channel Tunnel The Channel Tunnel (french: Tunnel sous la Manche), also known as the Chunnel, is a railway tunnel that connects Folkestone (Kent, England, UK) with Coquelles ( Hauts-de-France, France) beneath the English Channel at the Strait of Dover. ...

and

Seikan Tunnel The Seikan Tunnel ( ja, 青函トンネル, or , ), is a dual-gauge railway tunnel in Japan, with a portion under the seabed of the Tsugaru Strait, which separates Aomori Prefecture on the main Japanese island of Honshu from the northern isla ...

are longer, but they both have less undersea length). It has been estimated that the tunnel, if constructed, will cost €9–13 billion. It may open in the 2030s. The European Union has approved €3.1 million in funding for feasibility studies.

Background

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

and

Tallinn Tallinn () is the most populous and capital city of Estonia. Situated on a bay in north Estonia, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland of the Baltic Sea, Tallinn has a population of 437,811 (as of 2022) and administratively lies in the Harju ' ...

are separated by the

. The distance between the cities is about . Travel between the capitals is currently mainly by ferry and fast passenger boat, travel time varying from 1 hour 40 minutes (fast summer ferries operating from April to October) to three and a half hours (normal ferries operating year round), but most ferries now take two hours. Some eight million journeys are made by ferry each year, including both leisure cruises and scheduled commuter services. Overland travel between Helsinki and Tallinn requires an journey through

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

. There are also around 300,000 air trips done per year between the cities.

Project status

Both cities have promised €100,000 for preparatory studies, though the relevant ministries of each country have refused to grant any funding. An application is now planned to the EU to gain the additional funds needed for a comprehensive survey, estimated to cost between €500,000 and €800,000. On 13 January 2009, newspaper reports suggested the application to the EU, through the

Interreg Interreg is a series of programmes to stimulate cooperation between regions in and out of the European Union (EU), funded by the European Regional Development Fund. The first Interreg started in 1989. Interreg IV covered the period 2007–2013. I ...

programme, for comprehensive surveys had been denied. An expert at the City of Helsinki's International Affairs department suggested this may have been because of political tension within Estonia, between the national administration and the City of Tallinn, both controlled by rival political groups. Nevertheless, both cities are said to be considering funding the surveys themselves. On 2 April 2014 it was announced that a €100,000 preparatory survey named TalsinkiFix will assess whether a more comprehensive profitability calculation should be done. The European Union will cover 85 per cent of the survey costs and the cities of Helsinki and Tallinn and the

Harju County Harju County ( et, Harju maakond or ''Harjumaa''), is one of the fifteen counties of Estonia. It is situated in Northern Estonia, on the southern coast of the Gulf of Finland, and borders Lääne-Viru County to the east, Järva County to the sou ...

will pay the rest. This is the first official survey about the tunnel. The results of the preparatory survey were released in February 2015.Pre-feasibility study of Helsinki–Tallinn fixed link
(Sweco, February 2015) The cost of the tunnel was estimated to be €9–13 billion and the tunnel could open at earliest after 2030. The survey recommended the tunnel to be built for railway connections only with the traveling time between Helsinki and Tallinn being half an hour by train. On 4 January 2016 it was announced that the transport ministers of Finland and Estonia as well as the leadership of the cities of Helsinki and Tallinn will sign a memorandum on traffic cooperation between the two countries, including a further study to examine the feasibility of the tunnel. This study is the first to be conducted on the state level and will focus on the tunnel's socio-economical effects and geological analysis. Finland and Estonia are asking financial support from the EU for the study. In June 2016, the EU granted €1 million for the study which is expected to be ready in early 2018. In August 2016 a two-year study was launched by the Helsinki-Uusimaa Regional Council. Other partners in the study are the government of Harju County, the cities of Helsinki and Tallinn, the

Finnish Transport Agency The Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency ( fi, Väylävirasto, sv, Trafikledsverket), shortened to FTIA, is a Finnish government agency responsible for the maintenance of Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Rep ...

and the Estonian Ministry of Transport and Communications. The project is headed by Kari Ruohonen, the former director general of the Finnish Transport Agency. In February 2017 two consortia were commissioned to study aspects of the project. One will study passenger and freight volumes and do a cost-benefit analysis. The other will study the technical aspects of the project. In March 2019 a similar project by Peter Vesterbacka has moved forward. Vesterbacka has made a tentative deal with Chinese investment company called Touchstone Capital Partners. The deal consists of memorandum of understanding for a 15 billion euros financial deal to fund 4 stations, the tunnel and the trains. On 26 April 2021 the governments of Estonia and Finland signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on mutual cooperation in the transport sector. The MoU included the undertaking that both countries would cooperate in large-scale transport projects, such as the Helsinki-Tallinn railway tunnel, but it did not commit any of the parties to any particular project. The MoU will remain in force until 2030.

Cost and benefits

The cost of the tunnel connection has been tentatively estimated to be €9–13 billion. This includes €3 billion for the tunnel excavation, €2–3 billion for infrastructure and security systems, over €1 billion for

rolling stock The term rolling stock in the rail transport industry refers to railway vehicles, including both powered and unpowered vehicles: for example, locomotives, freight and passenger cars (or coaches), and non-revenue cars. Passenger vehicles can b ...

and other equipment and €1–3 billion risk marginal for unexpected situations. The project is estimated to be financially feasible if the European Union covers at least 40 per cent of the cost, the rest being shared by Finland and Estonia and the two capital cities (for comparison, the

Rail Baltica Rail Baltica (also known as Rail Baltic in Estonia) is a high-speed railway under construction between Warsaw, Poland and Tallinn, Estonia, with further connections to Finland via Baltic Sea cruiseferries or the proposed Helsinki–Tallinn Tunne ...

project has received 85 per cent of its funding from the EU). Amager North Öresund IMG 5605

The economic benefits would be significant, both in terms of increased connections and economic integration between the two cities (the

Øresund Region The Øresund Region ( da, Øresundsregionen ; sv, Öresundsregionen ), also known as Greater Copenhagen for marketing purposes, is a metropolitan region that comprises eastern Denmark and Skåne in southern Sweden. Centred around the Øresund ...

has been offered as an example), but also in a wider context of convenient passenger train connections between Southern Finland and the Baltic states, and a fixed link for freight from across Finland on to the Rail Baltica, thus providing a rail freight connection with the rest of Europe. An estimated 12.5 million annual passengers would use the tunnel. Geopolitically, the tunnel would connect two close but separated parts of the European Union in an environmentally friendly way, removing the need to use sea or air transport, or to travel through

. The Helsinki–Tallinn connection is part of the EU's

TEN-T The Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) is a planned network of roads, railways, airports and water infrastructure in the European Union. The TEN-T network is part of a wider system of Trans-European Networks (TENs), including a telecommunic ...

network's North Sea–Baltic corridor. The ports of Helsinki and Tallinn have previously received EU funding to improve transport conditions between the two cities.

Technical details

Railways in Finland and

use

track gauge In rail transport, track gauge (in American English, alternatively track gage) is the distance between the two rails of a railway track. All vehicles on a rail network must have wheelsets that are compatible with the track gauge. Since many d ...

. The Helsinki–Tallinn tunnel would according to current planning use

Standard gauge A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of . The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge (after George Stephenson), International gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge and European gauge in Europe, and SGR in Ea ...

tracks to connect directly to

which uses the same gauge. This means trains traveling through the tunnel from Tallinn to Helsinki could not continue onwards to other Finnish destinations and vice versa (apart from the Rail Baltica track) without new tracks being built or the use of a

variable gauge A variable gauge system allows railway vehicles in a train to travel across a break of gauge between two railway networks with different track gauges. For through operation, a train must be equipped with special bogies holding variable gauge whe ...

system. Tentative plans have been made to build separate freight stations in Southern Finland (

Riihimäki Riihimäki (literally "Drying barn hill") is a town and municipality in the south of Finland, about north of Helsinki and southeast of Tampere. An important railway junction is located in Riihimäki, since railway tracks from Riihimäki lead to ...

and

Tampere Tampere ( , , ; sv, Tammerfors, ) is a city in the Pirkanmaa region, located in the western part of Finland. Tampere is the most populous inland city in the Nordic countries. It has a population of 244,029; the urban area has a population o ...

have been suggested) which would make it possible to load trains outside Helsinki for transportation through the tunnel. Tampere and

Helsinki Airport Helsinki-Vantaa Airport (; fi, Helsinki-Vantaan lentoasema, sv, Helsingfors-Vanda flygplats), or simply Helsinki Airport, is the main international airport of the city of Helsinki, its surrounding Greater Helsinki, metropolitan area, and the ...

could also host passenger terminals for trains heading to Tallinn and onwards to Central Europe.

Studies

* Usko Anttikoski
"Fixed transport connections across the Baltic from Finland to Sweden and Estonia. Preliminary feasibility assessment."
2007.
"Emerald, Vision 2050"
Greater Helsinki Vision 2050 – International Ideas Competition. 2007. * Ilkka Vähäaho, Pekka Raudasmaa
"Feasibility Study, Helsinki–Tallinn, Railway Tunnel"
Geotechnical Division of the Real Estate Department of the City Of Helsinki. 2008. * Jaakko Blomberg, Gunnar Okk
"Opportunities for Cooperation between Estonia and Finland 2008"
Prime Minister's Office, Finland. 2008.

References

External links

The FinEst Link
– information about mobility between Helsinki and Tallinn, including the tunnel proposal *13 November 2018, 05:04, Kayvan Nikjou
This Is The €15 Billion Tunnel Connecting Helsinki To Tallinn
forbes.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Helsinki To Tallinn Tunnel Transport in Helsinki Transport in Tallinn Proposed undersea tunnels in Europe Proposed railway tunnels in Europe Railway tunnels in Finland Railway tunnels in Estonia Proposed transport infrastructure in Europe International tunnels Connections across the Baltic Sea