The Channel Tunnel

A history of the building of the Channel Tunnel, which connects England and France, with emphasis on the difficulties of digging a tunnel where some engineers said it could not be done.

The Channel Tunnel may be the greatest engineering project in Europe this century. This book describes the tremendous engineering achievement of the construction of the tunnel. Written by twenty of the key engineers involved, it provides a fascinating, informative and inspiring account of the project for both engineering professionals and general readers.

A bilingual book to celebrate the opening of the Channel Tunnel. Two moles, one French, one English, decide to dig a hole under the English Channel to see each other. The book has a hole running through it, and a moveable wheel in the middle.

Commissioned by the Cabinet Office and using hitherto untapped British Government records, this book presents an in-depth analysis of the successful project of 1986-94. This is a vivid portrayal of the complexities of quadripartite decision-making (two countries, plus the public and private sectors), revealing new insights into the role of the British and French Governments in the process. This important book, written by Britain’s leading transport historian, will be essential reading for all those interested in PPPs, British and European economic history and international relations. The building of the Channel Tunnel has been one of Europe’s major projects and a testimony to British-French and public-private sector collaboration. However, Eurotunnel’s current financial crisis provides a sobering backcloth for an examination of the British Government’s long-term flirtation with the project, and, in particular, the earlier Tunnel project in the 1960s and early 1970s, which was abandoned by the British Government in 1975.

The Channel Tunnel is a huge construction project, employing over 14,000 people at peak, and costing over 15611 billion of private money. It has succeeded in spite of great financial, political and techncial difficulties, and a fundamentally flawed contract. This book tells the story of the project, based on the coverage in Construction News and with commentary taken from recent interviews with key project sources.

The Channel Tunnel has been called the greatest engineering project of the century, overcoming a unique set of financial, political and engineering challenges. This book provides a comprehensive insight into the events which culminated in the first dry link between Britain and France. It describes the relationship between the site investigation, data interpretation and construction of the works. It examines areas such as the difficulties inherent in predicting geology from a relatively small number of boreholes and revealing how the use of modern geophysical techniques.

The Channel Tunnel is a major civil engineering feat which is in effect the host for an equally impressive and complex transportation system. These proceedings from a conference held in October 1994, address the key strategies and issues specifically related to the design, installation, commissioning, control, operation and maintenance of the transport system from the national road network into the terminals and through the tunnels. It addresses in particular how the design of the rolling stock, control, communicatin, ventilation and power supply systems have developed into reality, and how transportation issues and the maintenance and operation have played such a prominent role in the execution of the project.