To build a new economic growth hub in western Guangdong, the construction of the Zhanjiangbei Railway Station of Guangzhou-Zhanjiang High-speed Railway has entered an accelerated phase. Located in a key area of Zhanjiang's central urban district, northwest of Zhanjiang Airport, the development of Zhanjiangbei Railway Station will significantly enhance the city's transportation capacity, shorten the time and spatial distance between the western Guangdong region and the Pearl River Delta, and improve the layout of Zhanjiang's integrated transportation hub.

Zhanjiangbei Railway Station is a comprehensive station with a combination of inline and side-line designs. The total building area of the station building is as large as 105,000m². Once completed, it will become the largest high-speed rail station in the western Guangdong region along the Guangzhou-Zhanjiang High-speed Railway. Since the successful drilling of the first pile on January 6, 2024, the project has entered a substantial phase of rapid construction progress.

Difficulties and Coping Strategies

During construction, the site of Zhanjiangbei Railway Station is located in a marine sedimentary environment with alluvial flood plain. The geological conditions are complex, with 8m to 20m of thick sand layers and iron-containing interlayers, posing significant challenges for pile foundation construction. In response to this situation, and based on the actual conditions at the construction site and the progress of concrete structure construction, the technical team from Jianhua Construction Materials Group (hereinafter referred to as “Jianhua Construction”), in close cooperation with relevant partners, carried out multiple comprehensive and detailed revisions and optimizations of the construction plan. They also organized authoritative industry experts for rigorous verification to ensure the scientific, feasible, and reliable nature of the construction plan.

Explanation of Innovative Basic Design Solutions

After multiple rounds of verification, the foundation of the station building at Zhanjiangbei Railway Station adopted an outer core with 1m diameter cement mixing piles, while the inner core utilized the UHC700AB(180)-C105 prestressed ultra-high-strength concrete pipe piles, custom-designed by Jianhua Construction. Based on geological conditions and the upper load requirements, the pile lengths were set between 38m to 48m. This innovative design has proven highly effective. It not only successfully addressed the challenging problem of driving piles through thick medium-to-coarse sand layers but also fully met the stringent requirements for high load-bearing capacity in high-speed rail foundations. Furthermore, it resulted in a 14.47% reduction in foundation engineering costs. This solution is the first successful application of cement mixing piles and thick-walled piles in the railway system, serving as a model project with significant industry leadership. It will provide valuable reference experience for the foundation design of similar projects in the future.

Synergistic promotion of transportation upgrading and urban development

The pile foundation construction of the Zhanjiangbei Railway Station project is progressing steadily according to the established plan, with each construction phase closely coordinated and operating efficiently. According to the publicly announced schedule, the Zhanjiangbei Railway Station project is expected to be completed and pass trial operation acceptance by the end of 2025. As a crucial part of the national 'Eight, Fifteen Vertical And Eight Horizontal Railway Construction' and the 350 km/h coastal railway passenger transport corridor, the station is also the most technically complex, longest, and largest investment railway project independently funded by Guangdong Province. Once completed, it will play a key role in the regional transportation structure and provide strong momentum for the development of the transportation industry in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.