NEW WORLD WONDER

Evening Star, Issue 19923, 20 July 1928, Page 12

NEW WORLD WONDER

LONDON UNDERGROUND MWST INTRICATE RAILWAY STATION OF ALL. The world’s largest underground station, and probably tho most ingenious and intricate, railway station, is to bo presented to Londoners at the end or the year. „ , - It is Piccadilly, tho now Underground achievement and tho last word m subterranean accomphsbment, which today is publicly represented by a toursquare hoarding where Eros once stood. Millions of people pass this •qmt every day In omnibuses, in motor cars, and on foot they revolve around London’s mosi offensive eyesore with blase cynicism. Tliey have long since abandoned conjecture; they are tired of objecting to this ’hideous “chicken coop 1 ; Grey pass it without notice And yet barely 18in beneath the roadway is a weblike framework ol steel, and hundreds of workmen are busy with pick uird spade digging the cool damp gravel where next Christmas will be one ol the underground wonders of the world. VIVID TRIUMPH. Now, in its unfinished state, it is a vivid engineering triumph. To-mor-row. when thousands ol suburbanites pour into the brilliantly-lighted cavern beneath the wheels and ieet of London, it will be a commonplace process in tho art ol getting _ home. To-day it is romance:—soon it becomes almost mediocre. 1 have seen it in its unfinished state. 1 have crawled over the dank earth ol tho ancient Thames Valley (writes an English correspondent). I have bumped mv head on the girders, I have lain Hat on my stomach and, chin in hands, gazed across lilliputian-looking hall barely .lit high, where workmen, on their hands ana knees, pushed small trucks along a mine-like railway with the gravel that is swung into the full view of Piccadilly by the small familiar crane that is almost n permanent piece ol West End scenery. INESCAPABLE ROMANCE.

This romance is inescapable. What a contrast with tho modern “passimotro.” the glitter ol green and white tiles, the silent motion of escalators! it is all there in embryo. A few steps down the ladder Is Tho booking hall, the first slice of the excavat'on. A gigantic “ breast plate ” has been riveted and } illared up against tho concrete roadway above. Fifty-seven pillars have been erected in the earth tq hold the roof in place. Each pillar is capable of sustaining a load ol 250 tons!

“ Piccadilly is stronger no.v than when wo took the earth a wav,” an obviously practical foreman sail! to me. Bricks, pieces of timber, mid concrete blocks had been wedged between the upper edge of : tho steel and the concrete bod of the circus. SEVEN TUNNELS

I could hear the whirr and flap of rubber tyres overhead. The first loved of tbo booking hall lias been cut. A circular brick wall surrounds tho shallow space, and most of the steel overhead framework.is in place. Seven tunnels are being bored to seven different points in the circus. I. watched a workman drive the first drill into the earth which will be cleared to make a passage to the pavement at Swan and Edgar’s Nearly a quarter of a mile of show windows will encircle the station. Seven “ passimetres ” and scores of automatic booking machines will be installed. Eleven escalators are being constructed to handle the grandiose total of 50,000,000 passengers a year. ESCALATOR TO PLATFORM.

The time-honoured subterranean tour conducted by the underground railways at Piccadilly at present is abolished. The public practically step from tho escalators to the station platform. The descent is made from tbo centre of the now booking hall in two stages. Five stairways lead o''ft to a central platfbrm, whore on each side are triple escalators loading to each of the two railways. Confusion is obviated and speed assured. A reduction of one-half is estimated in tho speed of embarking passengers.