Speakers

Jost Auf der Maur

"For years, the Chur journalist and book author Jost Auf der Maur has been studying underground Switzerland. Auf der Maur presented this underground world in his book "Switzerland Underground". The author was also keen to draw attention to the enormous sacrifices made by the miners and their families to achieve this gigantic underground work. Jost Auf der Maur grew up in St. Gallen. He was a monastery pupil, night watchman, temporary postman, parachutist and sturgeon cook. For over 40 years he worked as an editor and author for various media such as "NZZ", "Geo", "Du" and "Die Zeit". With his books "Festland", "Söldner für Europa", "Xavier Mertz, verschollen in der Antarktis" and "Die Schweiz unter Tag", Auf der Maur has made a name for himself as an author and has received several awards for his work."

Klaus Juch

Klaus H. Juch, Cargo sous terrain AG, turns visions into real results. For him, the urban integration of logistics is the next challenge in Switzerland's spatial concept. "The challenge of finding new logistical ways to open up urban spaces succeeds when we start thinking the unthinkable."

As a civil engineer and urban manager in railway and civil engineering, Klaus Juch has helped to shape the expansion and renewal of infrastructures. With site development projects in Aargau, Baselland and the greater Bern area, he created sustainable added value for the development of the sites and for the companies involved.

Today, he is responsible for the Technology + Construction division at CST and leads the engineering team with numerous external partners for the infrastructure of the overall logistics project CST

Laurent Vulliet

"Laurent Vulliet is professor at EPFL (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne) and past dean. He is an experienced board member (incl. listed company) and was CEO of an international engineering firm. Recognized expert in governance, risk management and geotechnical engineering, he takes leading role in setting new vision in multicultural environments.
As member of the Federal Gelogical Commission of Experts, Laurent contributed to the elaboration of the Swiss Strategy related to the Underground on order of Federal Councelor Viola Amherd."

Antonia Cornaro

Antonia Cornaro, MA Urban Planning, New York University, has 25 years of working experience as an urban and transport planner from the public and private sector from New York City, London, Vienna, and Zurich, having worked for NYC Department of City Planning, Parsons Brinckerhoff (now WSP), the Austrian Institute of Regional Planning (ÖIR), and the Zurich based multi-disciplinary engineering consulting firm EBP.

In her current work as Management team member of Amberg Engineering she focuses on Urban Underground Space with the aim to increase mobility, livability, and resilience of urban areas.

This is also central to her work as Co-Chair of ITACUS, the International Tunnel and Underground Space Association’s Committee on Underground Space.

Antonia is passionate about cities, global and sustainable development, and has presented and published extensively on this subject. With Han Admiraal she co-authored the book “Underground spaces unveiled: planning and creating the cities of the future”, ICE, 2018 and recipient of the ISOCARP Gerd Albers award on best book.

Antonia also teaches at the Federal Institute of Technology, ETH Zurich. The Semester lecture Planning of Underground Space is taught to Master students in architecture, spatial development and civil engineering.

Han Admiraal

Han Admiraal, co-chair of ITACUS, has been fascinated by the possibilities of using the subsurface to create spaces that can help cities develop sustainably. He is based in the Netherlands and has his own company Enprodes. As a thought leader on underground space use he is actively involved with the Mission Earth First initiative based at Hagerbach. One of his interests is the combination of underground spaces and self-sustaining communities based on the idea that humans who want to create habitats on the Moon or Mars need to do exactly that: go underground and therefore think deep. Together with Antonia Cornaro he has written a book ‘Underground Spaces Unveiled – Planning and Creating the Cities of the Future.

Abidemi Agwor

Abidemi’s fascination is with how cities evolve and how the subsurface can be leveraged to address inherent challenges but much more the Social, Economic, and Environmental opportunities therein.

He has over 15 years of working experience developing and delivering Tunnelling and Underground space infrastructure. Currently leading the National Action on THINKDEEP Program for ITACUS.

He has a combined technical background in Geology and Civil /Tunnel Engineering as well as infrastructure developmental strategies for cities with unique expertise in Underground Space Use.

He founded ROWGA during COVID, a start-up dedicated to integrating Tunnelling and Underground space use with the instrumentation of technology and consultancy to solve some of the key urban challenges, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Abidemi’s Mission: “Unlocking Africa’s Underground Space Use for a Sustainable and Equitable Social Impact“

Elizabeth Reynolds

Liz is a Chartered Urban Planner and Director of Tapestry, an east London studio focused on planning, design and problem solving for urban environments. Over the past 20 years she has worked in multidisciplinary teams on major infrastructure and regeneration projects including the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and Crossrail. Tapestry works from detailed street designs to masterplans for major regeneration projects, with a common theme of making cities creative, productive, and resilient places. Liz is a member of Think Deep UK and has undertaken extensive research into the overlooked but important places beneath our cities, including through writing the book, Underground Urbanism published by Routledge.

Stefan Maurhofer

Stefan Maurhofer has been working for Amberg Engineering AG in Regensdorf for over 30 years in the field of technical processing, preparation of expert reports, project management and construction management of underground structures across all project phases in Switzerland and abroad. As chief construction manager and project manager, he has over 25 years of experience with excavations in loose material and hard rock for road and railway tunnels with single and double-shell interior construction. The best-known projects in which he has been involved are: Zugwald and Vereina tunnels, ZRH Airport Passenger Transport System (PTS tunnel), Uetliberg tunnel, 3rd tube Gubrist tunnel and Lucerne bypass.

He has extensive experience in the management / project management and contract execution of interdisciplinary large-scale projects in Switzerland and abroad. Since 2004, he has been a lecturer in underground construction at the OST University of Applied Sciences in Rapperswil (formerly HSR).

As former president of the FGU (SIA's specialist group for underground construction until 2023), he has an excellent network at home and abroad and the necessary acceptance. In October 2019, he was elected as the first Chair of the EUTF (European Underground & Tunnel Forum), which he led until 2022.

Eugenio Valli

Eugenio Valli is a Swiss engineer who graduated from ETH with a Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering. Eugenio completed his Master's degree with a thesis on a Virtual Reality (VR) application for creating interactive environments from CAD assembly data: Automated Generation of Interactive Virtual Environments from CAD Assembly Data. In 2020, Eugenio joined Swissloop Tunneling and took over the modelling of the hydraulic systems responsible for propulsion and steering. He later took over as head of the mechanical engineering department at the association and oversaw the modelling and implementation of Swissloop Tunneling's MTBM (tunnel boring machine) prototype: Groundhog Alpha. After his first year at the association, Eugenio became its president and took responsibility for developing the long-term vision and mission. Today, Eugenio still leads the Swissloop Tunneling team and was recently hired as project manager by Hagenbuch Hydraulic Systems AG, the association's leading partner. Eugenio's vision is to develop innovative and efficient micro-tunnelling solutions to improve underground infrastructure and later to scale up the systems developed by Swissloop Tunneling to realise the vision of the Hyperloop concept.

Felix Amberg

After completing his degree, F Amberg began his career as assistant in the Institute for Hydrology and Water Resources at the ETH in Zurich, Switzerland. This was followed by several positions, some lasting several years, as construction site manager and project engineer.

In 1986 F Amberg started to work at Amberg Engineering Ltd, which had been founded by his father, Dr. h.c. Rudolf Amberg. As PM he had been responsible for various underground projects. In 1995, he took over the responsibility and ownership of all companies of the Amberg Group. Under his leadership, the Amberg Group started to expand internationally and is now present in more than 25 countries worldwide. In the combination of Amberg Engineering Ltd, Amberg Technologies Ltd, Hagerbach Test Gallery and Amberg Loglay Ltd it offers a unique expertise in very many fields of underground infrastructures. F Amberg personally had been involved in many important engineering and r&d projects, such as the Vereinatunnel, the Gotthard Base Tunnel, Gibraltar Strait Tunnel etc. and EU research projects such as Tunconstruct, L-Surf and others.

He is former treasurer and member of the ExCo of ITA, secretary and member of the foundation council of the ITA-CET Foundation, former president of the Swiss Tunnelling Society and board member of Bauen digital Schweiz (Digital Construction Switzerland).

Felix Amberg is president and founder of the CUC Foundation and CUC Ltd - International Centre for Geotechnics and Underground Construction and he is Chairman of the Steering Board of the SCAUT Foundation - Swiss Center of Applied Underground Technologies, a competence center that works on innovative concepts and solutions for the use of underground space and the development of new technology applications.

Marcel Dobler

Marcel Dobler is an entrepreneur and has been an FDP National Councillor since 2015. In 2001, he founded digitec AG with two friends. Within 13 years, digitec has become the largest online shop in Switzerland. After the restructuring (possibly reorientation) of the traditional Swiss company Franz Carl Weber AG, Marcel Dobler remains associated with the company as a member of the board of directors. 

For Marcel Dobler, sport is the way to explore boundaries. Four Swiss championship titles in track and field decathlon and in bobsleigh resulted from his active time as an athlete. A passionate footballer, he is still active in the FC National Council.
Other activities:

• VicePresident digitalswitzerland 
• Member of the Board of EconomieSuisse 
• President of the Infrastructure Commission of EconomieSuisse