The 50:50 joint venture between Balfour Beatty and VINCI has been awarded the HS2 lots N1 and N2 phase 2 contract (construction) valued at £5 billion (about €5.75 billion).Lot N1 and Lot N2 are between the Long Itchington Wood Green tunnel to the Delta Junction / Birmingham Spur and from the Delta Junction to the West Coast Main Line tie-in respectively. Phase 1 for these contracts had been awarded in July 2017 for the design of the West Midlands area enabling the project to switch to construction.
Spanning on approximately 90km, the delivery of Lot N1 and Lot N2 will include engineering structures, tunnels and earthworks: 51 viaducts and boxes totalling over 14km and 76 overbridges, 7.5km of twin tunnel, 35 cuttings reaching over 30km, 76 culverts and other underbridges, 66 embankments reaching over 33km, 4 motorway crossings requiring box structures, and 6 interfaces with existing rail requiring both dive-under and overbridge structures. Lots N1 and N2 comprise a total of 1.8 million cubic meters of concrete and 32 million cubic meters of cut and landfill.
Work will start on site in summer 2020 with all the sanitary and safety rules that prevail according to the Covid-19 pandemic and would last 74 months. At the peak of activity, the project will employ 10,000 people.
