Canary Islands. October 2023. The Government of the Canary Islands has recently awarded a joint venture led by TEKIA the project to adapt the GC-1 Adolfo Cañas and Piedra Santa tunnels to the European Safety Directive.
To comply with Community Directive 2004/54/EC on safety in tunnels of the trans-European road network and its transposition into the Spanish legal system through Royal Decree 635/2006, the Government of the Canary Islands has awarded the UTE formed by TEKIA- GEOCONTROL and RABADAN17 the project to adapt the Adolfo Cañas and Piedra Santa tunnels, located at GC-1, to this regulation.
With this project, the security measures already existing in the tunnel will be increased, thus complying with the current regulations that they currently partially comply with because they are more demanding than those existing at the time of the tunnels' construction. The main actions will focus on the construction of an evacuation gallery in the Adolfo Cañas tunnel, implementation of new equipment and the evaluation of the functionality and degree of obsolescence of the existing facilities in both tunnels since most of them have been in service since the year it opened in 1999.
With a history of 25 years, TEKIA is an expert in tunnel safety with the execution of various projects in nearly 1,000 national and international tunnels, which makes it a company with extensive knowledge of tunnel equipment adaptation works. Since 2007, TEKIA has also provided Safety Manager services in more than 350 tunnels, which guarantees knowledge of current tunnel safety regulations.