Wapping Tunnel - London and North Western Railway. 2,250 Yards.
Wapping Tunnel, or Edge Hill Tunnel, in Liverpool, runs from Edge Hill junction to the Liverpool south end docks. The tunnel was designed by George Stephenson for the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, and constructed between 1826 and 1829, to enable goods to be transported by rail directly from Liverpool docks to Manchester.
The 1-in-48 gradient of the tunnel was too steep for the power of the steam locomotives of the day. Goods wagons were hauled by rope from the Park Lane goods station at the south end docks. Locomotives took over at the Edge Hill junction. The tunnel opened in 1830 and closed on 15 May 1972.
At some point, locomotives worked through the tunnel and cable haulage was abandoned.
The Edge Hill entrance is still open, but is not accessible to the public. Its portal is the middle of three tunnels at the western end of the Cavendish cutting. The right hand tunnel is the original 1829 tunnel into Crown Street Station, while the left hand tunnel is the later 1846 tunnel into the Crown Street goods yard.
Much of the above information is condensed from the Wikipedia entry.
A Moorish Arch was built over the line in the Edge Hill cutting. The flanking buildings accommodated the two stationary winding engines which powered the incline. [Check this].
The Crown Street passenger terminus was closed in August 1836 and replaced by the larger and more central new terminus at Lime Street. This was reached by a new double track tunnel, using cable haulage. A new engine house was built at Edge Hill, steam being supplied from a boiler in the old Edge Hill cutting through a long tunnel excavated through the sandstone on the north side of the cutting; this was known as the ‘steam tunnel’; the boiler was housed in a chamber in the cutting wall. Goods and coal traffic continued to be handled at the old Crown Street station and a second wider tunnel into Crown Street was driven in about 1846. In the 1860’s the Edge Hill cutting was widened, forcing the demolition of the Moorish Arch.
From 1870, the line into Lime Street was locomotive hauled and a large chimney with an engine-driven fan was built on Smithdown Lane, near Edge Hill. Smoke in the tunnel remained a major problem until the two track tunnel was opened up into a deep four track cutting with seven short lengths of tunnel remaining to support various roads and houses. At Edge Hill a further tunnel was opened in 1849, north of the Lime Street tunnel. See Waterloo Tunnel.
The above information is heavily condensed from here.[1]
Evidence of the tunnel can be seen above ground in the form of three stone and brick ventilation towers. One is in the landscaped area between Crown Street and Smithdown Lane, one is on Blackburne Place , and one is close to Grenville Street South. There were at least two others that were later demolished, one adjacent to Great George Street, and one by Myrtle Street. Some or all of these were late additions to the tunnel, being built in1895/6. The one at Blackburne Place, for example, is not shown on the 1890/3 25" O.S. map, but it does appear on the 1924/7 map, occupying the site of two houses.
Newspaper Reports
1828 'COMPLETION OF THE RAILWAY TUNNEL. — The final communication between the shafts of the Railway Tunnel has been effected; and there is now uninterrupted passage from the intended depot near Wapping, to the deep cutting at Edge-hill. This magnificent work is about 2,200 yards in length, 22 feet wide, and 16 feet high; it is almost entirely cut through the solid rock, but which, in several instances, is so shattered and broken, and occurs in such thin bed, or layers, as to render it necessary to insert an arch of brickwork for the security of the roof. Numerous droppings water, which issued through the pores of the rock, have been successfully stopped by the application of Roman cement. Looking at the extent and magnitude of this undertaking, with all the difficulties inseparable from such work, and considering that it is little more than eighteen months since it was commenced, (during which time no less than 160,000 tons of stone have been removed from beneath the surface, and made subservient to the purposes of improvement above,) we cannot but be astonished at the rapidity of the operations which have effected it. We understand that preparations are making for lighting it with gas and when, this is done, the public will be admitted to a sight of it. It is expected that there will a sufficient current of air from the bottom to the top, to answer all the purposes of ventilation.'[2]
1847 'Mammoth Machinery. — On Saturday we observed some immense parts of machinery which were being conveyed through the town ; on inquiry, we learn that they were destined for the tunnel on the Liverpool and Manchester section of the London and North Western Railway, at Wapping, Liverpool, and were from the works of Messrs. Peel, Soho Iron Works, Ancoats. A very large shaft attracted our attention ; it was thirty-one feet long, fifteen inches in circumference in the centre, and seventeen inches at each end, and was composed of wrought iron, being manufactured at the large forge hammer of the Soho Iron Works. This mass of wrought iron was 10 tons in weight, and we believe it is the longest shaft that has ever been constructed of wrought iron. There was also a large three sheaf pulley of sixteen feet diameter, and weighing upwards of ten tons, from the same manufactory.— Manchester Courier.'[3]