About

Are you interested in the Helsinki-Tallinn tunnel, twin-city development and new transport solutions?

Welcome to the FinEst Link project website!

Helsinki and Tallinn constitute an economic area of nearly 1.5 million people with busy traffic connections for people and freight. The twin cities Helsinki-Tallinn form an economic and logistic hotspot that is constantly growing. Last year the port of Tallinn welcomed its 10 millionth passenger. Both Helsinki and Tallinn handle growing volumes of freight, commuters and leisure travelers for the needs of the growing cross-border area between Finland and Estonia.

While the growing volumes of freight and passengers between the twin cities are a positive sign of interaction, they produce congestion and bottlenecks in traffic. The FinEst Link project explores the development needs in transport between Helsinki and Tallinn in a long-term perspective. On one hand the project analyses how the existing fast ferry services and connections could serve the increasing traffic volumes between the ports of Helsinki and Tallinn. The project also carries out a feasibility study that analyses from an economic and technical standpoint whether there are grounds for visioning a sub-sea railway tunnel between the two cities. The results of the project will be available in spring 2018.

The FinEst Link project (2016-2018) with a total budget of 1.3 million euros has received co-funding from the EU’s Interreg Central Baltic progamme. The project consists of six partner organizations in Finland and Estonia: Helsinki-Uusimaa Regional Council (lead partner), City of Helsinki, Finnish Transport Agency, Estonian Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications, City of Tallinn and Union of Harju County Municipalities.

The FinEst Link project is built on openness and transparency. On this webpage you can find updates and results in the course of the project’s lifecycle related to, for instance, methodology, data, conclusions and recommendations.

Newly published

The FinEst Link subreports are published in the Studies section of this website (published 11.4.2018)

FinEst Link Feasibility Study – Final report (published 7.2.2018)

Video presenting the key results of the Project (12 min)

FinEst Link brochure

The geological survey on the proposed railway tunnel route options made by the Finnish Geological Survey (February 2017).

The FinEst Link new technologies challenge (October 2017)

Studies

FinEst Link subreports

(11.04.2018) In addition to the project’s Final Report, several subreports are now published. The subreports provide more detailed analysis and background data for the feasibility study.

WP2: Comparative impact analysis

Annex 1: FinEst Link Scenario 0+

Annex 2: FinEst Link Passenger Volume Estimation

Annex 3: Finest Link Cargo Volume Estimation

Annex 4: Finest Link Cost Benefit Analysis

Comparative Impact Analysis

Wider Economic Impacts appendix

WP3: Technical concept and economic assesment

Tunnel solution subreport

WP3 Tunnel scheme memo

Strategic Environmental Assessment

Alignment Alternatives subreport

WP4: Benchmarking

Benchmark and Financial Analysis: Final report

Benchmark and Financial Analysis: Summary

Benchmark and Financial Analysis: presentation

WP5: Communication

Considerations for next steps of the project and key milestones

FinEst Link project’s Final Report

(07.02.2018) The Helsinki-Tallinn Transport Link Feasibility Study summarises the results of the technical and economic feasibility study of the Helsinki-Tallinn railway tunnel.

FinEst Link Feasibility Study – Final report

Video presenting the key results of the Project (12 min.)

FinEst Link brochure

Geological Survey of the Helsinki–Tallinn railway tunnel route

(20.2.2017) Geological Survey of Finland (GTK) conducted acoustic-seismic surveys of the possible linings for an undersea railway tunnel between Helsinki and Tallinn. The survey provides a detailed information of the geological structure of the sea floor between the two cities. To read more about the geological survey, click here.

Objectives

The FinEst Link analysis is based on the following objectives

Improvement of the travel service to facilitate daily commuting between Helsinki and Tallinn
Including reduction of travel time between the cities to approximately 30 min, frequency of travel service, ticket price.

Smooth travel chains and integration with transport systems
Including integration of travel chains into the national rail networks, public transport systems in both cities, airports and Rail Baltic.

More effective freight transport chains
Including affordable travel service price, improvement of frequency, reliability and delivery time.

Improved environmental sustainability
Including improved energy efficiency, healthy urban environments and lower carbon dioxide emissions.

Improved safety and security
The transport solutions are safe and reliable.

Economic viability
The implementation model of the tunnel is based on minimal public support for the investment cost.