| Fact file |
| MIND THE GAP! Trains don’t fit some platforms because the tunnels followed roads. To avoid demolishing buildings they dug down rather than bored through |
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The London Underground was the world’s first subterranean railway system.
The mainline railway stations in London are all a mile or so outside of the city centre. So all the train passengers had to pile onto horse-drawn trams or cabs or walk to get to the city centre.
Charles Pearson, the City of London Corporation’s solicitor first came up with the solution. In 1863 The Metropolitan Railway opened between Paddington and Farringdon. A new engineering project finally began to transform commuting in the capital.
A big breakthrough was Barlow’s Patented Tunnelling Shield. Miners could dig behind a watertight screen, lining the tunnel in cast iron as they went, without damaging the properties above.
But it took a crucial technological advance to get really deep stations, reliable trains and an extensive Underground system - electricity.
Today there are 275 stations, and 2,670,000 journeys a day.
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