Omaha daily bee., 1906-09-02
NATIONS IN A TUNNEL RACE
Rivalry Between American and Brit
ish Contractors In New York
Tunnels.

With English engineers and workmen on
one side and American engineers and work.
men on the other great race Is now
going on underground in New York. The
course Is under the depths of the East
| river and the racers are fighting their
way through walls of granite ancient as
the sun and striking here and there a bed
of mud fraught with varied dangers.
| One of the racing crews is made up of
the Englishmen employed by Pearson &
Son of London, England, who have the
| contract for building the great Pennsyl-
vania railroad tunnel from Manhattan to
Long island. Several blocks up the river
from the English workmen the rival gang
of American workmen and engineers who
are building what is known as the Belmont
tunnel. which is TO connect Long Island
City with the subway in Manhattan at the
Grand Central station at Forty-second
| street.
The race might we'll be termed the tunnel
handicap for the Englishmen had two OF
three months start of the Belmont people.
When the Belmont people began work they
were at first held back by court injunctions
and legal tangles. but finally the word was
given and they were of.
It was just then that the Englishmen,
who had been driving away every hour
of the twenty-four. began TO encounter
difficulties until at present their side has
developed into an obstacle race.
The Belmont people sank their shafts
on Man-of-War rock out In the East river.
where the government has just finished
spending several hundred thousand dollars
in removing the reefs that obstructed the
channel. Over the site OF this very rock
which the government engineers had taken
out the Belmont people anchored barges
filled in the river, made a safe foundation
and thcn sank their shaft down to the river
bed and through the rough granite until
they reached the designated depth Of the
projected tunnel.
Then they began driving headings both
ways. One heading is aimed straight for
Long Island City. while the other heading
is worming its way toward Forty-seoond
street Manhattan.
From shafts sunk In Manhattan workmen
are battling their way through sand and
rock eager TO join hands with their fellow
workmen under the river. From another
shaft in Fourth street in Long Island City
another gang OF workmen are driving their
workings under the river toward the gang
who are blasting a road to meet them.
Thus at several points with feverish haste
gangs of workmen night and day are bur-
rowing toward each other. Through
Fourth street in Long Island City, from
West avenue to Jackson avenue. a trench
has been opened and dug to the required
depth, and now the work OF building the
concrete foundations and walls Of this sec
ton Of the tunnel is under way. This will
be the Long Island approach to the tunnel.
II would appear that all along fortune
has favored the Belmont tunnel people.
Most Of their workings have been through
coarse granite. and a. a result the work OF
driving the tunnel through has progressed
with no serious hitch.
But while good fortune has character
lied the operations OF the Belmont work.
ers. according 10 report. the Bnglishmen.
who are boring the four tubes for the
Pennsylvania tunnel. have struck hard
luck enough to equip several tunnel un-
dertakinss with the blues. Every oontin-