Category: Architecture

  • Pontcysyllte aqueduct chaos!

    View of the aqueduct taken in 2004 by the author. This, the featured image, is taken from the same position where the narrowboat photos for the AI generated videos were shot – as discussed below. When the canals have so many problems such as breaches and the likes, like the massive breach on the Bridgewater…

  • The Rove canal tunnel #2

    This is the second part of the posts covering the Rove canal tunnel. In the first part the canal was approved and construction given the go ahead. The canal and the tunnel’s construction finally began in 1905(**). Due in part to the massive Rove tunnel, it was predicted that the Marseille-Rhône canal would take eight…

  • The Rove canal tunnel

    This is a special feature covering the Rove tunnel in France. This follows on from the recent Railways and Canal Tunnels series. Rove tunnel deserves a whole post because there’s very little in the way of English websites or blogs featuring this gigantic tunnel. The enormous subterranean waterway system, which was built for inland transportation…

  • When anyone reads London Rail every article is faithfully written and research is intense (and by the way not a single cent is earned). Not only that the output has detail and facts which others who are often paid and almost certainly abled (including speech) simply don’t bother with. The latest from a certain London…

  • A Tower Subway memo

    A London Inheritance published a post detailing the Tower Subway and also implied the southern end of the subway happened to be a mystery because it could not be ascertained whether the modern structure behind the Unicorn Theatre in Vine Lane was indeed its southern end. Its not its original southern end however the tunnel…

  • In writing about railways and canal tunnels one might perhaps wonder why railways and canals in general are not the subject of discussion – apart from the Railway and Canal Historical Society who have existed since the 1950s with the aim of bringing history and topics on both together. There’s no doubt railways were substantially…

  • When one looks at existing Glass Fibre Reinforced Concrete (GRC) buildings that have been around far longer than the Elizabeth line stations, one can only stand in awe, for these older buildings, some in very harsh climates, have withstood the test of time miles better. Indeed it looks as if the Elizabeth line’s stations have…

  • This third instalment looks at the longest canal tunnel in the UK and a long forgotten canal built underneath the centre of Manchester – and how the railways took advantage of this subterranean canal. Despite a dearth of canal tunnels across the pond this instalment also includes two examples of tunnel in the States (which…

  • The modern day exorcist has arrived! It could be anyone, even you or me, but in this case its TfL. The long standing controversy of those ghostly marks that are a feature of the Elizabeth line has finally seen a solution implemented. Its a simple case of cover the damn things! Evidently its easier to…

  • This is part two of the railways and canal tunnels feature. Whilst it was suggested one of the earliest contractors railways had occurred during the mid 1780s as suggested in part one of this feature, the fullest history is incomplete there in terms of railway chronology – and that is because the next railway/canal combo…