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Faroe Island roundabout under the Atlantic Ocean
- jbj 6y agothe construction project: https://www.ncc.no/vare-prosjekter/undersjoiske-tunneler-faroyene/ https://www.ncc.no/vare-prosjekter/undersjoiske-tunneler-far...
- zerof1l 6y agoI fail to understand why Faroe Islands need such tunnel in the first place considering the costs. There's only about 52,000 inhabitants on whole archipelago. Also it doesn't seem like they have a bunch of factories and much of production going on.
- Taniwha 6y agoThey have tunnels between almost all the islands, being able to drive between the islands rather than taking a boat on dangerous seas makes a lot of sense
- jillesvangurp 6y agoThe article mentions a budget of a billion DKK. This would be a bit over 100M $. So, expensive but not that outrageous. Populations on these islands and their economies are small precisely because it is hard to get there and requires operating ferries (which costs money as well). Solve that problem and you might expect to see an effect on the local economy (more tourism, cheaper to move goods around, commutes to the mainland, etc.). If you then consider that they'll be benefiting from this for decades/centuries, it suddenly becomes a wise investment.
- jacobush 6y agoI'd say it's downright cheap.
- cinntaile 6y agoFor the size of those tunnels that's pretty cheap I'd say. Both are about 11km and the most expensive one is 142 million usd. Even if you were to double the cost it's still fairly cheap. I wonder if it's paid for by the people living there or if it's paid for by the Danish mainland? Probably both. This will provide a good boost to their economy in the longer run.
- IfOnlyYouKnew 6y agoIt's paid for by the value of having a distant outpost in the middle of The Atlantic, and the EEZ that comes with it.
- halgir 6y agoIt's financed by loans, paid for by tolls: https://www.tunnil.fo/english/pay-toll-charge/ https://www.tunnil.fo/english/pay-toll-charge/
- user2994cb 6y agoThey have tunnels through a lot of the islands as well - mostly single track with passing places (looked pretty terrifying when I was there a couple of decades ago, though I was never the one driving).
- user2994cb 6y agoA useful reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tunnels_of_the_Faroe_Islands https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tunnels_of_the_Faroe_I...
- pestatije 6y agoWow, that's impressive tunnelling. On par with the swiss I'd say. Any plans for the big one (Suduroy - Shetlands ~250Km)?
- robga 6y agoI visited the Faroes 4 years ago. Locals were proud of their cold storage industry. Fish from North Atlantic trawlers flash frozen many hours earlier than delivery to the continent. Lucrative. I imagine a cross island road network would help this industry, opening new avenues for trawler arrival. It was a wonderful place to visit.
- throwaway936482 6y agoBecause it will make life immeasurably easier for the inhabitants and Denmark can easily afford it? There are better ways of measuring the value of an investment than "will it make a bunch of vastly wealthy hyper capitalists even richer" which is the usual HN metric.
- fogihujy 6y agoInvesting heavily in the infrastructure of the Faroe Islands and Greenland gives Denmark leverage whenever those territories start talking about independence. Furthermore, it's increasing the standard of living for the people who live there, and having infrastructure in place makes it easier to attract businesses in the future. There's also a cool-factor.
- usrusr 6y agoSo basically Copenhagen's way of keeping Faroe Islanders on Faroe Islands. Do they get along that badly? And it's not money given to Faroe Islands, it's money given to companies much closer to home for doing cool digs beneath Faroe Islands. I believe that Denmark understands this difference very well.
- fogihujy 6y agoThere were plenty of people from the Faroe Islands and Greenland when I lived in Copenhagen a few years ago, and I never got the impression that Danes are hostile towards any of them. The Kingdom of Denmark is trying to keep itself in one piece though, and ensuring that people in the Faroe Islands and Greenland are happy being a part of the Kingdom is probably a good way of doing just that. Otherwise, they might just say yes when some US president attempts to buy them.
- halgir 6y agoI don't follow local politics much, so I'm not 100% sure about the following. But my impression is that it's financed by loans, paid for with tolls for using the tunnels. And I think the project is being dug by Norwegians. Denmark does pay a yearly subsidy to the Faroe Islands of ~105M USD to help with general upkeep, but that's not earmarked.
- Thlom 6y agoIn Norway we are currently building bridges and tunnels to a few islands with less than 3000 inhabitants for more than double the price of this Faroe project. :-)
- jeofken 6y agoIs it common for rich Norwegians to legally move to Sweden and use almost Swiss level ISK to escape the 25% capital gains and ~1.4% wealth tax?
- jeofken 6y agoFor posterity: I misremembered how much wealth is disincentivized in Norway - it’s “only” 0.85% wealth tax and 24% capital gains. This explains why there are way fewer who become millionaires in Norway than in Switzerland, even if Norway is so rich in resources while CH is not
- Thlom 6y agoNo.
- torgard 6y agoYou used to have to take a large detour to get to Klaksvík - which is the second largest town - from Tórshavn (the capital). By taking the tunnel, you shave off 27 minutes. Travel time to almost all of the north-eastern islands, and the towns on these islands, has been cut down by half an hour. It is also safer. They also argue that it is cheaper, but I don't know about that. Ignoring industry, that's just quality of life. But consider a car accident; the ambulances have to get there in a hurry. Minutes might save lives here.
- ovi256 6y ago> consider a car accident; the ambulances have to get there in a hurry. Minutes might save lives here. If that's the reason, why not build that tunnel in a big city, where there are a lot more accidents and lives to be saved ?
- halgir 6y ago> Faroe Islands > Big city Choose one. Though being serious, it takes about five minutes to drive to the hospital from any point in the capital if you have sirens going.
- torgard 6y ago> why not build that tunnel in a big city The Faroe Islands are _tiny_. Land area of about 1,399km² Just a little bit larger than New York City, which is 1212km². Long Island, NY more than twice as big.
- chrisseaton 6y ago> Also it doesn't seem like they have a bunch of factories and much of production going on. What’s this got to do with anything?
- dijit 6y agoEconomy is all that some people think about, never standards of living or politics.
- jVinc 6y agoWhen the financing for much of this was agreed upon it was under the previous danish prime minister Lars Løkke, who's wife is Faroese. The second he stopped they founded a company there which has close ties to some travel company among other things. Besides this the family has general connections to the economy there naturally.
- p1mrx 6y agohttps://web.archive.org/web/20201204062422/https://nordfra.dk/faroe-island-first-roundabout-in-the-world-under-the-atlantic-ocean/ https://web.archive.org/web/20201204062422/https://nordfra.d... I don't understand why they'd say "in the world under the atlantic ocean", when the atlantic ocean is a subset of the world. Is there already a roundabout under one of the other oceans?
- emteycz 6y ago"First roundabout under the ocean in the world" is probably what they wanted to say.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- antonvs 6y ago"Faroe Island's" "first roundabout in the World", "under The Atlantic Ocean."
- IfOnlyYouKnew 6y agoYeah, it's a pretty roundabout way.
- xwdv 6y agoFaroe Island has never built a roundabout anywhere in the world, and now it has done so underneath the Atlantic Ocean.
- hijp 6y agoMore pictures and a map: https://www.estunlar.fo/en/about-the-tunnels/the-eysturoy-tunnel/ https://www.estunlar.fo/en/about-the-tunnels/the-eysturoy-tu... It's amazing they did this in four years for $160mil while here in Hawaii our elevated rail broke ground in 2011, is going to cost between $9 and $13 billion, and is expected to be completed in 2033. Please send the construction team over here next...
- lultimouomo 6y agoThese pictures are rederings though.
- hijp 6y agoSure but from the main article I couldn't tell why they needed an underwater roundabout in the first place.
- AdhemarVandamme 6y agoThe Eysturoy tunnel is an Y-shaped tunnel, connecting three islands of the Faroe. (Edit: Not entirely true, as two of the mouths are actually on different peninsulas of the same island Eysturoy.) I guess they could have chosen to dig 2 different tunnels, but that would probably have been more expensive because of the increase in kilometers, seeing how long they dig under land at the mouths in order for the tunnel to be deep enough at the banks/shores.
- halgir 6y agoThis article has photographs of the roundabout itself being decorated by a local artist: https://portal.fo/dagur-36150/myndir-listaverkid-hja-trondi-patursson-i-eysturoyartunlinum-verdur-sett-upp.grein https://portal.fo/dagur-36150/myndir-listaverkid-hja-trondi-...
- skrebbel 6y agoI love that each exit has a different colour light. The neon lights in themselves strike me as rather tacky, but knowing you usually drive from the blue exit to the green exit is super useful and user friendly.
- awiesenhofer 6y agoIf you like the combination of scandinavia and infrastructure: norway is currently also working on an amazing project to connect their costal region via a new coastal highway featuring some stunning tunnel and bridge proposals: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCT-FurFVLQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCT-FurFVLQ
- unhammer 6y agothough it'll probably be delayed because they forgot that the wetlands they're building it through store lots of CO2 https://www.nrk.no/norge/xl/klimabombene-ingen-tenkte-pa-1.15217036 https://www.nrk.no/norge/xl/klimabombene-ingen-tenkte-pa-1.1...
- blunte 6y agoAnd soon, first truly literal interpretation of "underground drifting".
- interfixus 6y agoObligatory nitpick: Faroe Island's. Should be Faroe Islands'.
- JoeAltmaier 6y agoThat photograph is beautiful. A work of art! The arch spanning that grand space, the track lighting making it look like an image from space, the curved walls. Like nothing on Earth!
- timoth 6y agoIt sounds like Norwegians were involved in building this, and they have precedent for this look. "hardanger bridge roundabouts" is a search term which will get you some pretty images for roundabouts like this. Admittedly they're not under the ocean, but they are underground at each end of the world's longest tunnel to tunnel suspension bridge. Underground funkily-lit roundabouts are pretty amazing!
- lastofthemojito 6y agoI was on vacation in Norway, driving from Oslo to Bergen, when I happened to take the Vallavik Tunnel and came across a roundabout in a tunnel for the first time in my life. The length of some of the Norwegian tunnels is mind-boggling enough (the Lærdal Tunnel is 24km/15 miles long!), but coming across a dramatically-lit roundabout in a tunnel made me feel like I was in Mario Kart or something, not the real world.