[Rajpal:] Many thought it was impossible, but after years of digging and boring through mountains of rock, engineers broke through on the longest tunnel in the world last October, linking Italy and Switzerland. The Gotthard Rail Tunnel is expected to revolutionize transport across Europe, as Becky Anderson reports.
[Becky Anderson, Cnn International Correspondent:] At 7:00 in the morning, Zurich Main Station is already bustling. I'm here to catch a train heading south through Switzerland, crossing the Italian border, and onto the city of Milan. Every day, about 10,000 people make this journey. The train will follow an old, winding route across the Alps and through the famous Gotthard Tunnel. The tunnel was first opened in 1882. It's ten miles long and was the first to be built through this mountain range.
[Anderson:] And way back then, the idea of having tunnels at some of the highest points was considered absolutely revolutionary. Today, with the help of modern engineering, a new tunnel is being built below the existing one. We're now traveling above what is considered to be the longest tunnel in the world, 600 meters or about 2,000 feet below us is the Gotthard Base Tunnel. And when it's open, it will provide a flatter and faster route through the Swiss Alps. For centuries, the Alps, a huge natural barrier, have hampered the smooth trade between countries like Germany and Italy. The rail and road routes are an important link along the north- south axis in Europe. Traffic has increased sharply in the past 30 years, and we are now operating at capacity.
[Simon Peggs, Alptransit Gotthard:] The main reason for the construction of the tunnel was to get the goods traffic off the motorway onto the trains. Imagine like this that the Alps are like a speed bump in the middle of a motorway. To get rid of that speed bump, we have to go underneath. The old railway line climbs about 1,000 meters, so the trains have to be shorter and they can't go that fast. They have to wind their way all the way up to get over, down the other side. With this, it runs at 500 meters above sea level all the way through, all the way to Milan. So trains can go faster, and they don't need that much energy to go all the way through. At the moment, down there, in that part, they're finishing the cross section. That's where the intermediate attack came into the axis of the tunnel. So, they're doing the finishing work there, the concrete work. And further up the tunnel, the railway fitting has already started. At this stage here, this has become about a whole lot of electrical mechanical stuff being put in. It's like if you install a DVD player, you've got to get all the switches in the right place to get it to work. So, that's the challenging part. A few years ago, the challenge was the mountain, the rock.
[Anderson:] It took about 14 years of digging, blasting, and boring through 20 different rock strata. Eight people lost their lives in the process. The final breakthrough happened in 2010.
[Peggs:] We've excavated underneath an overburden of 2,500 meters. That's never been done before. A tunnel, this size.
[Anderson:] The tunnel is scheduled to be fully functioning by 2016 and will take up to 300 trains each day underneath the Alps. Well, that has taken just less than four hours. When the Base Tunnel is complete, the trains will run as fast as 250 kilometers an hour. That will cut the journey between Zurich and Milan by about an hour. Today, Zurich is the gateway to Switzerland and the center of one of the most modern and efficient railway networks in the world. This is thanks to Alfred Escher, considered by many as the founding father of modern Switzerland. He had a vision of an extensive rail network that went beyond the country. Over 150 years later the new Gotthard Tunnel bears witness to his vision, and Zurich Hauptbahnhof remains an important hub within the European rail network.
[Rajpal:] You're watching CONNECT THE WORLD. When we come back, Republican candidates in the US are brushing up on their foreign policy. They're getting ready for another TV debate. And it seems a new face is leading the race. All the details just ahead.