INFRASTRUCTURE
Caption Channel to Tunnel the image car shuttle interior
ON DECEMBER 1 1990 , British and French tunnellers met in the centre of the under-construction Channel Tunnel , creating the first land junction between the two nations since the ice age .
The historic moment also marked the half-way point of a six-year construction some 200 years in the making . This record-breaking achievement of infrastructure has a long history .
Tunnel plans date back to Napoleonic times , with various ideas suggested since . Although popular with industry , invasion threats delayed matters until more peaceable times . Even so , two previous digging attempts were made , in the late 1870s and more recently in 1974 . Both were halted for economic reasons , but both were ultimately used in the modern tunnel ’ s construction for surveying work and transportation of materials .
10 July 2014