Explore Europe and Beyond: Journey Through the World's Famous Tunnels!
 

Many of our clients enjoy traveling to Europe, and it’s one of my favorite destinations, too. But one thing I haven’t done yet is go through the “Chunnel.” Officially known as the Channel Tunnel, it runs under the English Channel for about 31 miles, connecting England and France. Used by passenger and freight trains (cars can go aboard LeShuttle, a railway service), it is the longest underwater tunnel in the world. It opened in 1994, took six years to build and came in way over budget at 4.65 billion pounds.

            A cross-channel tunnel was not a new idea, not even a 20th century idea. Way back in 1802, a French mining engineer proposed a tunnel under the Channel, with illumination from oil lamps, horse-drawn coaches and an artificial island positioned mid-Channel for changing horses. That project didn’t get off the ground—or under it, as in this case—but it did start people on both sides of the Channel thinking about it. And now, there are some people thinking that the idea of an undersea tunnel might just work for something that is somewhat larger in scale: a tunnel under the Atlantic Ocean, linking New York and London.

            With airliners able to make the flight in eight hours, how could a tunnel even be practical? It might, using vacuum tube technology. By creating a vacuum within the tunnel and using pressurized vehicles, trains traveling along the structure could theoretically reach speeds of almost 3,000mph, making the journey last only an hour.

            Digging a tunnel under the Atlantic would be the most enormous engineering project in history. Using the Chunnel construction as a guide, the Atlantic tunnel would take nearly 800 years to build, and cost upwards of $20 trillion. Those numbers suggest it’ll be a while before anybody gets serious about this project, but tests of the vacuum-tube technology, also called a “hyperloop,” are underway in India and China right now.

            There are other tunnels that are actually happening. Norway just broke ground on the Rogfast Project, which promises to become the world’s longest and deepest undersea road tunnel, connecting the Norwegian mainland with some offshore islands. It will be just under 17 miles long and at its deepest point would be almost 1,300 feet under the water’s surface. The cost: $20 billion US. Another one that’s underway is the Fehmarnbeit Tunnel between Denmark and Germany, which will be the world’s longest road and rail tunnel when it opens in 2029.

            Bridge-builders aren’t ignoring the challenge of the tunnels. A new bridge linking Greece and Turkey over the Evros River is slated to open to vehicle traffic in 2027. China has been building a lot of them; since 2005, the Chinese have constructed nine of the top 16 longest bridges in the world. The U.K. recently shelved plans to build an over-water bridge linking Britain and Ireland. It was to be 12 miles long over the Irish Sea, The problem was not the length of the proposed bridge, but what would be underneath it: Beaufort’s Dyke, a 35-mile-long natural trench created during the last glacial period. Its average depth is 500 feet, twice that at its deepest point. It’s what’s down there that really killed the project: for about 30 years after World War II, the British government used the Dyke as a munitions dump. There are more than a million tons of unexploded munitions down there, as well as chemical weapons and even radioactive waste. Combine that with rough seas, strong currents and the unpredictable weather of Scotland and Northern Ireland, and it all caused the Brits to think that the bridge might not be the best idea to pursue right now.

            Just so you know, the longest suspension bridge in the world is not the Golden Gate in California. It’s the 1915 Ꞔanakkale Bridge in Turkey, with a main span of over 6,600 feet. It opened in 2022. The Golden Gate (4,199.5 feet long) is only number 20 on the list, right behind America’s longest, the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge in New York. Closer to home, the Mackinac Bridge that connects Michigan’s Upper Peninsula with the lower part of the state is 28th at 3,799.2 feet.

            Maybe your next trip to Europe will include riding the rails under the Channel. Give us a call, and we’ll get you on board!