The tunnel boring machine Tytana has broke through after boring a 252 metre-long water tunnel  from Broomloan Road in Ibrox, in the shadow of Ibrox Stadium, to the north side of Bellahouston Park.

Scottish Water say:

The tunnel, which goes below the M8 motorway, Paisley Road West and the Glasgow-Ayr railway line, is part of more than seven miles of new water mains being installed in a project which will connect the Glasgow area’s network and the system in Ayrshire to increase resilience and protect supplies for customers.

The TBM installed the tunnel at a depth of up to 20 metres below ground – the equivalent of the height of a seven-storey building – while thousands of road and rail users above went about their daily business undisturbed and largely unaware.

It excavated about 1,311 tonnes of rock, such as sandstone and mudstone which went to landfill, and installed a total of 100 sections of pre-cast concrete pipes each measuring 2.5 metres in length and taking the total weight of the tunnel to about 500 tonnes.

The work using the TBM in Ibrox is a key part of a project to improve Scottish Water’s water mains network in the south west of Glasgow by installing new pipes which will connect the Glasgow area’s network and the system in Ayrshire to improve the security of supply for customers.

Connecting the networks will provide a two-way water supply between the Milngavie Water Treatment Works (WTW) system, which provides water for more than 700,000 people across much of the Glasgow area, and the Bradan WTW system which supplies more than 200,000 customers across much of Ayrshire. It will also benefit almost 50,000 customers in East Renfrewshire.

https://www.scottishwater.co.uk/About-Us/News-and-Views/2023/08/290823-Glasgow-Resilience-Project-TBM