WestConnex road tunnelling begins in Sydney Wednesday, 20 July 2016

Tunnelling has started on the first of Sydney's WestConnex tunnels, a 5.5 km section connecting Homebush and Haberfield in the city's inner west.

“This is a milestone event for the congestion-busting WestConnex motorway, which will deliver more than $20 billion in benefits to NSW and create 10,000 jobs during construction,” said NSW Premier Mike Baird.

The first road header has begun its journey underground from Cintra Park in Concord. Tunnelling will begin at four other sites later this year.

Known as the M4 East, this section of road will connect to a widened M4 at Homebush and the City West Link at Haberfield. The new tunnels will be among the widest in the southern hemisphere and will bypass a heavily congested section of Parramatta Road, helping motorists who currently get stuck in traffic at the end of the M4.

The $2.7 billion project is being delivered by a CPB John Holland Samsung Joint Venture and the M4 East will open to motorists in 2019.

When complete, the WestConnex will join the M4 and M5 in a continuous motorway with connections at Rozelle, Camperdown, St Peters and Sydney Airport.

“WestConnex is the largest integrated transport and urban revitalisation project in Australia, bringing together a number of important road projects to form a vital link in Sydney’s Orbital Network,” said John Holland Group Managing Director Glenn Palin.

“Our tunnelling expertise has been deployed on many major infrastructure projects worldwide and we’re pleased to be able to contribute to the economic growth of Sydney with a project that eases congestion, creates jobs and connects communities."

A separate CPB Dragados Samsung Joint Venture is working on the New M5 part of the project, which will run via twin tunnels from the existing M5 East at Kingsgrove to a new interchange at St Peters. The final stage of the project will join the tunnels from Haberfield to St Peters.

[The Cintra Park site where tunnelling is beginning. Photo: NSW Government]

Infrastructure will be a major topic of discussion at the Australian Engineering Conference 2016 in Brisbane on November 23-25.