NEW THAMES TUNNEL

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 70, 19 September 1936, Page 24

NEW THAMES TUNNEL

TO COST THREE MILLIONS Work on the £3,000,000 DartfordPurfleet tunnel under the' Thames is to begin the next few weeks, it was officially announced on August 13, says the "Daily Telegraph." A pilot tunnel, 12 feet in diameter and 900 yards long, will be constructed first, with shield chambers and other works needed for the later building of the main tunnel. This section of the work will cost £300,000, and the Ministry of Transport has accepted the tender of Charles Brand anfl Sons, Ltd.

Two ventilation shafts, one on the Essex bank and the other on the Kent bank, will be They will be 35 feet in diameter, and will connect with the shield chambers, from which the work of building the main -tunnel will ultimately start. The shafts will be about 100 feet deep, and the pilot tunnel vvill be v 2O to 25 feet below the river bed. The main tunnel will be over a mile long. North of the Thames the approach will connect with the Pur-fieet-Grays (Road, and an extension is proposed to the London-Southend Road. On the south the tunnel approach will connect with the Dartford Southern by-pass and the London-Folkestone and London-Hastings" Roads. At present there is no facility for crossing the Thames by bridge or tunnel below Blackwall Tunnel, which is 35 miles from the mouth of the river. The proposed Dartford tunnel is about 12 miles further down the river.