3-028-399 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Thames Subway at Tower-Hill: entrance to tunnel, 1870. Tunnel under the River Thames in London, designed by William Henry Barlow. 'The upper opening of each shaft is covered by a small square building, at the door of which passengers take their tickets, then enter and descend in the lift. On reaching the bottom they find a space of a few feet between the shaft and the buffers fitted up with benches, as a waiting-room... On the railway runs an omnibus conveying twelve passengers...When the omnibus arrives and has discharged its load, those who are waiting step in and start off for the other end. The descent of the shaft occupies twenty-five seconds, and the omnibus journey seventy seconds; so that a passenger may descend into the shaft at Tower-hill and emerge in Vine-street in a minute and three quarters from the time of his descent... The lifts, as they only carry half as many passengers as the omnibus, will make twice as many journeys ; and it is intended to give priority of ascent to first-class passengers, who pay twopence, while the second-class passengers pay one penny'. From "Illustrated London News", 1870.