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Amid Debate Over Safety, Turkey to Unveil Bosporus Tunnel Amid Debate Over Safety, Turkey Unveils Bosporus Tunnel
(about 7 hours later)
ISTANBUL — With its skyline stitched by minarets and its soul straddling the Bosporus waterway, this city has long defined itself as geography’s junction between East and West, where the European landmass meets the Anatolian steppe and cultures intertwine.ISTANBUL — With its skyline stitched by minarets and its soul straddling the Bosporus waterway, this city has long defined itself as geography’s junction between East and West, where the European landmass meets the Anatolian steppe and cultures intertwine.
Just as durably, predating the Ottoman conquest in 1453, the Bosporus, which connects the Black Sea with the Sea of Marmara, has been a watery obstacle in the path of travelers and invaders alike, and a protector of those within its confines. More prosaically, as Istanbul has ballooned in recent decades into a clogged metropolis of 16 million people, it has offered urban planners a challenge: how to ease the commute of millions of travelers each day using ferries and two road bridges to cross in both directions. Just as durably, predating the Ottoman conquest in 1453, the Bosporus, which connects the Black Sea with the Sea of Marmara, has been a watery obstacle in the path of travelers and invaders alike. As Istanbul has grown into a clogged metropolis of 16 million people, the strait has presented urban planners with a challenge: how to ease the cross-Bosporus commute for the millions of people who use the city’s ferries and two road bridges.
On Tuesday, the newest attempt to span nature’s divide will be officially inaugurated — midway through a debate on whether it is ready or even safe for conventional traffic — when the authorities mark the 90th anniversary of the founding of modern Turkey by unveiling a $4 billion, 8.5-mile rail tunnel almost 200 feet below the Bosporus seabed, part of a broader project called the Marmaray to bind two continents closer together, ease congestion and, in more grandiose visions, eventually form part of a trade route stretching from Europe to China. The newest link was formally inaugurated on Tuesday, the 90th anniversary of the founding of modern Turkey. Officials cut the ribbon on a $4 billion, 8.5-mile rail tunnel that runs almost 200 feet below the Bosporus seabed, part of a broader project called the Marmaray meant to bind Europe and Asia closer together, ease congestion in the city and, in more grandiose visions, eventually form part of a trade route between Europe and China.
For some critics, the tunnel stands as an emblem of cost overruns, delays and the soaring ambition of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a former mayor of Istanbul, to build a legacy of massive monuments of infrastructure including an airport that will rank as the world’s biggest, a canal parallel to the Bosporus and a third bridge high above the waterway. Thousands gathered for the ceremony in the Uskudar district, a stronghold of the ruling Justice and Development Party on the city’s Asian side. Reflecting their allegiance to the party and its leader, most participants said they had come to support their country and their prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who presided over the event.
But it also resonates in history, the fulfillment of a longstanding dream since Sultan Abdulmejid first raised the idea of a submarine crossing in 1860, long before the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in the First World War, and long before the advent of the technical expertise to build one. Its construction, moreover, starting in the mid-2000s, has, like other grand construction projects here, shown the extent to which Istanbul perches atop a palimpsest of antiquity. “It is because of him that we are becoming more advanced than the West, and setting an example for the world,” Aysel Ipekci, 41, who attended the ceremony with her children, said of the prime minister. “I brought my little boys here because I wanted them to be inspired, so one day they can conquer this country like Erdogan has done.”
The project was supposed to take four years, but was delayed when engineers discovered the remains of a 4th century Byzantine port as digging works got under way. By 2006, the cost of the project was estimated at $2.6 billion, much of it financed by Japan. Younger people in the crowd seemed more fascinated by the project itself. “I just don’t understand how the tunnel doesn’t fill up with water,” said Mert Bila, 15. “I won’t believe it until I see it.”
The timing of the inauguration on Tuesday on a historic anniversary has raised some eyebrows. “The part that is in service is very limited. All that has been delayed until much later,” said Tayfun Kahraman, a city planner, according to Agence France-Presse, “We are wondering why this inauguration is happening so soon.” Many spectators said they would wait for others to test the tunnel before riding through it themselves. “Nothing that runs under water can be safe,” one man told his wife, who seemed hopeful for an alternative to her usual daily ride in a packed bus.
Suleyman Solmaz, a senior figure at the Chamber of Architects and Engineers, said that “it would be murder to open it under these conditions.” The biggest issue was that it lacked an electronic security system and could flood. “I wouldn’t get in the Marmaray and nobody should until these issues are addressed,” he quoted an engineer on the project as saying. For some critics, the tunnel stands as an emblem of cost overruns, delays and the soaring ambition of Mr. Edrogan, a former mayor of Istanbul. Looking to his legacy, Mr. Erdogan has proposed huge infrastructure projects including a vast new airport, a canal parallel to the Bosporus and a third cross-strait bridge.
But the government feted the event and its timing on the 90th anniversary of the modern state founded by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. “Turkey will celebrate two feasts together,” said the transport minister, Binali Yildirim. But the tunnel also resonates in history, fulfilling a dream first put forward by Sultan Abdulmejid in 1860, when the city was the hub of the Ottoman Empire, and no one yet knew how to go about building an undersea tunnel.
Some have raised concerns about the tunnel’s location in a region of high seismic activity. But, Mr. Yildrim said, it has been built to withstand an earthquake with a magnitude of 9.0. It will be, he said, the “safest place in Istanbul.” Construction began in the mid-2000s, and like other grand construction projects here, it soon demonstrated how Istanbul perches atop a palimpsest of antiquity. The original four-year schedule was delayed soon after digging began, when engineers discovered the remains of a fourth-century Byzantine port.

Ceylan Yeginsu reported from Istanbul and Alan Cowell from London.

And the opening, though long delayed, may still be premature. “The part that is in service is very limited,” a city planner, Tayfun Kahraman, told Agence France-Presse. “We are wondering why this inauguration is happening so soon.”
The biggest issues seem to be that the tunnel still lacks an electronic security system and that it could flood. Suleyman Solmaz, a senior figure at the Chamber of Architects and Engineers, said “it would be murder to open it under these conditions,” and added that an engineer on the project told him he would not dare ride through the tunnel until those issues were addressed.
The government went ahead with the ceremony on the nation’s anniversary anyway. “Turkey will celebrate two feasts together,” said the transport minister, Binali Yildirim.
He dismissed concerns about building the project in a seismically active area, saying it was designed to withstand a 9.0-magnitude earthquake. The tunnel will be, he said, the “safest place in Istanbul.”

Ceylan Yeginsu reported from Istanbul, and Alan Cowell from London.