1938-10-01 — Page 11

THE CHINA MAIL, OCTOBER 1, 1988.

Building

Rage

Station In Clay

World's Greatest Feat Of Railway Engineering

FOUR YEARS' WORK: NOT A TRAIN HELD UP

One of the world's biggest engineering feats is being accomplished, deep down in the clay of London.

A

It involves the complete reconstruction of King's Cross Underground station, which is to become the largest and most elaborate ever placed at the service of people who travel below street level.

is due to be finished by the end of, Repatriation Impossible November, but not until some

months later will the final touches TALKS, SAID

be complete.

Mr. Roberts explained to me the UNDER WAY BUT

process by which the escalator shafts are sunk.

NARROW MARGIN OF ERROR

LONE BATTALION

First comes a comparatively nar- TO RETAIN row pilot shaft. This is enlarged to

an intermediate size of somewhat Reports tirat the Shanghai Muni- greater diameter, and, anally, en- cipal Council was considering the larged again to form the shaft pro- repatriation of members of

"Lone Battalion were categorically per..

the

The whole job is elaborately sur- denied by Mr. Eugene Y. B. Kiang, veyed, first on the ground and after wards underground.

prominent local attorney and S.M.C. councillor, who is at present nego- When the new shafts at King's tiating with Mr. Cornell S. Frank- Cross were finally linked with ex-lin, chairman of the S.M.C., on the isting tube tunnels, the margin future status of the interned sol- of error amounted to no more diers. than about, half an inch.

Mr. Kiang has already held Running through the escalator several lengthy conversations with

The entire / But, though thee work under-shaft I saw fine strands of..piano | Mr. Franklin regarding the sold-

denied

Started in April, 1996; part of a fine open space in its stead. the new station will be opened in the early spring.

ground-js being rapidly pushed wire. These are surveyors guide iers since the S.M.C. chairman's re- scheme, to cost £550,000, will be forward, no comprehensive plan lines. And in the ceiling of one of turn recently. While he completed by the summer of 1940. has been acided upon for re-the tunnels Mr. Roberts showed me that there was even a remote pos- Then, for the first time, two tube construction at street level. The a tiny, but all-important notch, sibility of the soldiers being re- turned to the native homes, as thé systems and the Metropolitan Rail- London County Council has reject-marking dead centre. way will be served by one self-ed the original proposal for & In the construction of these new Chinese press would have it, he escalator shafts, connecting tunnels voiced hope that the "Lone Bat- contained station, affording quick, "roundabout.”- easy connection between the three

below ground and temporary tun-talion" problem may be settled lines.

1 went underground to view the nels to accommodate passengers quickly and to the complete satis- work in progress on the new book-while the work was in progress, a faction of all concerned.

total of about 1,000 tons of cast iron segments has been used.

FOUR PLATFORMS:

?

S

CONCRETE CAVERN

These "passagen had first to be bricked up solid, and then the line of the new shaft cut through the brickwork,

An entire new station is being ing hall and the escalators to the built on the Metropolitan, under two. Tubes -Euston-road. It will have four ~made my tour of these new

To build the new escalator shafts, platforms, and will be the terminus works in company with the assis it was necessary to cut through for a large number of through tant. resident.tengineer, Mr. C. N. six of the existing tunnels and pas trains from the northern suburbs: Roberts. We entered the under-sages, taribelow ground level. which at present stop at Baker-ground - booking hall-by a “ladder street.

through a hole in the roof. Although the gigantic scheme I found myself in a large, con has meant reconstructing sections crete cavern, to which there will of tube, and taking up long ultimately be five entrances. lengths of roadway above ground, In one corner was a huge pipe, not a single Tube train has been big enough for a man to crawl delayed, and, thanks to elaborate through. That was the air duct traffic control, bus time sheets for the elaborate ventilation system show that surface traffic is actual-below.

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ly moving along. Euston-road. On a lower level, where faster than before half of it was ultimately machinery for : the "up.”

escalators will be installed, From the roof of a high building men were paddling in 'gum boots, overlooking King's Cross. I had the up to their knees in liquid cement. entire scheme explained to me by In front of me was the escalator the London Transport: resident en-shaft, leading to the Piccadilly gineer.

Tube.

:#

“The best that can be done,” Mr. Kiang informed The China Press, "is to bring the Council and the soldiers together on a basis mutual understanding."

of

The "Lone Battalion," it will be recalled, recently clashed with the Russian volunteers over a dispute concerning the hoisting of a Chin- ese national flag in their Kiaochow LONDON'S MİNERS "It sounds crazy,” Mr. Roberta Road Camp in commemoration of admitted, "but for reasons of safety the first anniversary of the out- the shafts must have something break of hostilities in “Dhanghai behind them. They cannot be driven last August 12. In the subsequent fracas several of the interned sold- through-air."

Working on the job are Lon-iers were fatally wounded in the baton charges of the Russian Regi- don's-own-minere men......who

ment. spend lives burrowing under London, in clay. They are clay experts, and have an almost un- canny instinct for danger. In spite of all the precautions de

To prevent similar disturbances, it will be remembered the S.M.C. decided to separate the officers

from their men.

Far below me I could see a deep, At the moment, it is a vast cirvised by the engineers, the whole shored-up trench along Euston-road, cular cavern, in which workmen safety of these underground boring where the remaining wall of the lare busy sealing the joints between operations depends, in the last re-shaft passes only 18in. below one of new Metropolitan station is now the iron segments of which it is con-sort, on the rigilance of the men the train tunnels of the Piccadilly

#Tube. being built.

structed, first with a packing of actually on the job.

Chief problem of the engineers at While excavating the booking- Gaping holes in the roadway indi-lead, then a coat of bitumen, and,

King's Gross has been to avoid hall, workmen unexpectedly came cated entrances to the new Under-finally, a concrete finish. ground booking hall.

From this first escalator, existing tunnels. The whole ground across what is believed to have been short pasange leads to the second is honeycombed with railway tun- the old Flest ditch, loosely. Milled escalation down to the Northernnels, both from the main-line stain with earth and bricked over.

As is common in tube construc- Tube, and here work is so artions and far underground, and also advanced that men are now indipassageways linking the two Tube tion,work, buildings have had to be underpinned, and sewers and other stalling the escalator machinery lines.

Looking down on the job I could also visualise the King's Cross of the future, as town-planners hope it might be, with all the present jumble of out-of-date,,tunsightly buildings cleared away from.........in

The main construction of the At one point the lower escalator mains moved.

front of the main line station, and booking hall and the two escalators.

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