Thanks to UK comedian Dave Gorman and the BBC Magazine’s Alternative tourist map of Britain, I’ve fallen in love with the Greenwich foot tunnel (pictured).
Look further! It has a dome at each end, almost infinite length and endless fascinating perspectives.
Opened in 1902, the tunnel runs 370m under the River Thames and is lined with white tiles — though the section in the photo has a thick steel and concrete inner lining to repair World War II bomb damage. You can see that more clearly in the Dave Gorman’s larger photo.
Perhaps it’s unpatriotic to lust after a very English tunnel on the 75th birthday of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, but somehow this tunnel intrigues me. I suspect that once I see it “in the flesh” I’ll love it as much as ’Pong loves the Newtown railway underpass.
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19 March 2007 at 6:17 pm
Snarky Platypus
It looks very _Doctor Who_. I wonder if they’ve already filmed there.
20 March 2007 at 6:52 am
Stilgherrian
Somehow I suspect the makers of _Doctor Who_ would find it “too obvious”. On the other hand, I did see someone describe the cupolas and their internal lifts (elevators) as “the TARDIS as imagined by H G Wells”.