THE CHANNEL TUNNEL.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVII, Issue 18046, 13 March 1919, Page 4

THE CHANNEL TUNNEL.

5 Three schemes for improving the oross;<Jhaimel communications between Eng- | land and France were persistently ■founder discussion during the nineteenth | century, the bridge scheme, the tunnel Jj scheme and the train ferry. The bridge powerfully supported as it was, I'Jias never found general favour, though < a Channel Bridge and Railway Com- ? ,pany thirty years ago prepared plans > for a structure costing in the neigliof thirty millions sterling and [spent large sums of money in ascertaini ing what line would furnish the sound[est foundations. The train ferry, auj thorised long ago by the Imperial Parl liament, came into operation during | the war period, when it was urgently f necessary to save time in the trans- ' port of 'troops and munitions of war. \ And now the tunnel scheme is to be taken in hand as a means of providing employment for discharged soldiers. With Mx- Bonar Law's announcement that the Government is giving the ..scheme its immediate consideration it l may perhaps be assumed that within a ’decade England and France will be £ linked by a tube. If the Government : does not itself provide the necessary [ funds'and carry out the work there will an abundance of private capital a available for the undertaking. Five or c years ago it was estimated that the M Work could bo carried to completion seven years, at a cost of about $xIf'teen millions sterling. Years ago the wealthy Ohemin de Fer du Nord in > France, with the backing of the French % Jtothschilds, secured the necessary coniJ cessions to enable it to the , French half of the scheme, but the « British Government seems to have been M persistently opposed to the plan, for • as late as 1907 it forced the withdrawal of a Bill promoted by tbo Channel Company, a syndicate that represented the amalgamation of an older | company with the rival Submarine | Railway Company, which, in turn, had >. taken over the tunnel rights of the South-Eastern Railway Company. It is . not generally known that the railway company carried out considerable works between Folkestone and Dover with the Idea of testing the ground. A shaft was sunk 164 feet into the chalk and an inclined driftway, seven feet in diameter, was then driven for more than a mile under the sea. This preliminary work was stopped by the Government in 1882. The scheme was revived in 1905 and the development of closer political relations between France and i Britain encouraged the promoters in the hope that authority would soon be given i for the raising of the necessary capital. ■ It is not stated now whether the pro- | posal is that the Government should • oarry out the work, but presumably ; that is the intention, for it was recently stated that the Government was in possession of a great deal of the necessary plant and had no mind to dispose of it. The company’s estimate in 1913 was that a tunnel railway would earn from a million and a quarter to a million and a half sterling a year ■ and that the working expenses would be under half a million, so that there would be an ample margin to pay interest from the outset.