This communication presents results from a case history in Barcelona involving a large cut-and-cover railway tunnel requiring a deep excavation (H > 20 m). The presence of a number of medium to high-rise buildings alongside the excavation prompted the necessity of an induced risk management strategy. This strategywas based on a sequence of increasingly refined risk analyses and an explicit vulnerability assessment. The preliminary and standard analyses were largely based on empirical extrapolations and a moderate amount of site investigation. The detailed analysis stage involved a more comprehensive soil investigation, advanced numerical analyses and the execution of two instrumented trial sections.