The €350m project has taken five years to complete and involved the reconstruction of four stations, the installation of 35km of new track, widening of 15 bridges and 17 culverts, and the installation of 52km of new overhead catenary including 720 masts. Two new electronic interlockings have been installed and the existing electronic interlocking at Lüneburg has been modernised. DB also installed 17km of noise barriers along the line.
The construction of the third track will help the route to accommodate increasing volumes of freight traffic to and from the port of Hamburg, much of which passes through Maschen yard north of Stelle.
