Thames Tunnel

The Thames Tunnel is a tunnel beneath the River Thames in London that connects Rotherhithe and Wapping. It is 35 feet wide, 20 feet high and 1,300 feet long, and runs about 75 feet below the river surface at high tide. It is the first tunnel known to have been built successfully under a navigable river. Marc Brunel and his son Isambard built it between 1825 and 1843 using the tunnelling shield that the elder Brunel invented with Thomas Cochrane, after earlier attempts by Cornish miners and others had failed in the soft clay and quicksand. The tunnel was designed for horse-drawn carriages but was used mainly by pedestrians and became a tourist attraction. Flooding and money problems halted work for years, and the tunnel was walled off in 1828 before work restarted. In 1869 it was converted to a railway tunnel for the East London line, which since 2010 has been part of the London Overground.