12
Since the opening of the Elevated Railways the increase of travel has been more than all the passengers they carry, showing that the travel in this direction will increase up to the extent of the accommodation which is offered.
The Arcade otters in all respect the most effectual remedy and relief the ingenuity of man can contrive. It duplicates the street; it oilers the most complete accommodation for way and through travel; it furnishes cheap and rapid transportation for freight and express; and by thus removing all obstructive vehicles from the upper street, systematizing the travel, and by the application of a motive power vastly more effective than can he used on the surface street, it would treble the capacity of Broadway in all the essential elements which make a street useful, and adjacent property valuable.
Our visit was fortunately timed, as we found the Engineers engaged in constructing one of the most intricate and difficult portions of the Railway, viz.: upon the two miles of the extension eastward from the Mansion House, through a net work of narrow and crooked streets, along which were standing every variety of buildings, from the heaviest and most costly to the oldest and most decayed.
Many of these, especially the latter, were torn down, either for the extension of the stations or for the purpose of providing additional breathing places, and others were maintained by tunneling under them for the passage of the Railway.
The works on this line embraced all of the varieties of construction which had been adopted elsewhere on the Railway, and we found them in every stage of progress, from that of placing the temporary roadways and works, temporarily seeming the water, gas and sewage pipes, and the permanent works therefor; the wooden protections and small tunnel excavations for underpinning and supporting the houses, and for excavating and laying up the side walls, also of the top arching and placement of the iron girders, and of the method of excavating and removing the materials.[1]
At Victoria street the Railway was carried under a very large and heavy breweiy. In this case the side walls and arch covering were increased in thickness, and twelve massive wrought iron girders were stretched across above the arch to take the weight of the building and of the large weighty vats.
Near the same place the foundation of the Railway had to be placed at 15 feet below the level of the base walls of, some high buildings, and in another case the Railway was carried diagonally under another set of heavy buildings.
At St. James station there is a house of fourteen stories high—the highest dwelling in London. The Railway excavations were made within 20 feet of its face and 15 feet below the level of its base walls.
At Victoria Station the Railway was carried under the largest sewer in London, having a cross section of 151 square feet. The level of the invert of this sewer is 8 feet below high-tide in the
Thames, and the rail level of the Railway had to be depressed to 21 feet 9 inches below, and the excavations at this place had to be extended to 28 feet below high or 15 feet below low water tide level.
- ↑ Note.—There has been taken from the deep excavations on this, the oldest part of Loudon, a great many rude Roman implements and pieces of pottery of an earlier date.
