Ceneri Base Tunnel for Basler & Hofmann, Zurich, Switzerland

The 15.4-kilometre Ceneri Base Tunnel in Ticino is the last key structure of the New Rail Link through the Alps (NRLA). With its opening, a continuous flat rail route runs through the Swiss Alps from northern to southern Europe. Basler & Hofmann, responsible for the design and detailed engineering of the ballastless track, commissioned infrastructure photography of the Ceneri tunnel as a piece of civil and railway engineering.

The Ceneri tunnel infrastructure photography dates from 2017, three years before the tunnel opened: the track precisely installed, the technical systems under test, the tube still free of traffic.

The brief was the functional clarity of built engineering: structural concrete, exact track alignment and the particular atmosphere of an underground rail axis. With no trains running, the tunnel stood completely still. Working with the installed tunnel lighting and our own lights, long exposures let us stop down far enough to hold the alignment sharp to the far end of the frame.

Part of our Reportage & Landscape work.