A 9.8 million-pound machine dubbed Mary keeps on boring through sediment as it makes its way under the harbor from Norfolk to Hampton.
The $101 million tunnel boring machine, named after Hampton aerospace engineer Mary Winston Jackson, recently hit a major construction milestone in the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel expansion project. Mary has dug halfway through the first of two planned tunnels, according to a Dec. 22 social media post from the Virginia Department of Transportation.
“Meeting major milestones has been kind of a great thing for us in 2023,” project spokesperson Brooke Grow said.
Digging since April 2023, the tunneling machine has now traveled 4,006 feet of the 7,940 feet needed to complete the first tunnel. It arrived in Hampton Roads in late 2021 in 170 containers, according to VDOT, and was reassembled before its work began.
Once reaching the HRBT’s north island in Hampton, Mary will turn around and create the second tunnel. Once Mary breaks through this spring, the machine will be rotated in a receiving pit and sent back to Norfolk, project director Ryan Banas said in an email update.
To get ready for Mary’s breakthrough, 548 cement trucks poured 5,480 cubic yards of concrete into the north island receiving pit. Banas said the 31-hour event on Nov. 19 was the largest continuous concrete pour in VDOT history.
In other updates, Grow said construction crews have begun work on the bridge over the west side of 13th View Street in the Willoughby Spit area of Norfolk. The single-lane traffic flow, which had been on the west side of the road, will now switch to the other side during construction, which is scheduled to last until February.
Crews plan to shift eastbound traffic lanes onto the north island’s new trestles in early 2024, Grow said.
The more than $3.9 billion project will widen Interstate 64 from two to four lanes in each direction and construct two two-lane tunnels, doubling the capacity of the road segment. Grow said the project is expected to be complete by November 2025.
To check on the boring machine’s latest progress, visit hrbtexpansion.org/tunnel-boring/.
Trevor Metcalfe, 757-222-5345, trevor.metcalfe@pilotonline.com