The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1899-06-08
UNDER LoNDoN's BUSIEST SPOT.
Excavations for the Central Station of
Three Tunnel Roads.

Three Tunnel Roads.
That marvellous piece of engineering
work down under the roadway at the
Mansion House is just approaching the
| close of one very important stage,
I though the whole work will certainly
not be finished till November, and per-
haps not then. Anybody privileged to
go down below there cannot fail to be
amazed that it should have been found
| possible to do what has been done while
| the full tide of London's traffic has been
going on just overhead. When they be-
gan work here, the whole of the great
eXpanse of roadway had a solid earth
foundation, except that the ground was
ramif1ed by an astonishing tangle of all
sorts of pipes, ranging from the old
wooden water pipes of past age up to
| hydraulic mains and the pneumatic
tubes. Now, the space down below the
| road is another world Of gloomy CALLER
les and impenetrable voids, dimly illu-
| minated by electric glow lamps, and
peopled by a whole host of dusky
gnomes, who still seem to be wriggling
their way down into the bowels of the
earth
There Is a great circular gallery run
ming all round just under the road, and
from this passages shoot off in various
directions, upward and downward. I'm
derneath this is a corresponding gallery
in which the various services-gas wa
ter. hydraulic power, pneumatic dis
patch, telegraph and telephones-have
oil hppy1 nbo - ,rJo l,r
system, and lie there in the gloom very
impressively suggestive of the veins and
arteries through which are rushing the
life currents and nervous pulsations of
the tremendous world whose dull echoes
roll sullenly through the weird OBSCURE
ty.
The great space in the center of these
two subterranean galleries seems still to
be abandoned to chaos, and is one i'm
penetrable mystery Of glowing lights
and dark shadows, steel girders and
brick walls and dusky figures that look
to be hopelessly laboring to evolve order
out of the confusion. The booking office
of the Central London railway will be
here, and from the thick of the disorder
black, unbelievable shafts drop down
perpendicularly to the railway platforms
below In these shafts will probably
run up and down the five hydraulic lifts
that will carry up and down ninety or a
hundred people at time.
The roadway, which formerly was
solid, is now nearly all of 1t supported
on steel Orders. and what remains tenn
porarily propped up on balks of timber
and brick walls will in the course Of two
or three weeks get its steel beams under
Meath it and the timber and the bricks
will be knocked away. There will be a
mass of concrete laid above the Orders,
and when that has had four or five days
to dry and harden asphalt will cover it
ALL The work has been done in ten or
eleven sections, and only one of these
sections has now to be done, and this
most difficult and troublesome engineer
ing feat win have been got safely
through
There will never again be any need to
break up the roadway between the Bank
and the Mansion House, and probably
before the end of the year there will be
a light and convenient subway all round
this busy space. to be reached by short
flight of steps from either of the street
corners.The South London Electric rail-
way and the city and Waterloo will have
direct communication with the subway
by slopes.
It is interesting to learn that the whole
of the great and intricate system Of steel
Orders and pillars upon which the road
way at the Mansion House is being laids
had already been erected experimental
ly in a field at Derby. The business
having been thus rehearsad, as it were,
the whole fabric has been brought Sec
ton by section and put here in the heart
of London. IT seems probable that the
extensive obstruction on the pavement in
front OF the Royal Exchange will not be
cleared away till toward this time next
year.-L0ndon Daily News.