"Expensive Holes"

Stubbornly shaking his head, George Rowland Blades, Baron Ebbisham, onetime (1926-27) Lord Mayor of London and Alderman for the Ward of Bassishaw, was the only dissenting member of a board of five which last week enthusiastically endorsed the long-shelved project to build a 20-odd-mile tunnel under the English Channel, connect London and Paris by rail. Not so Lord Ebbisham. Pressed for reasons, he contented himself with remarking ominously: "The displacement of sailors on the Cross-Channel Route would be regrettable."

Soon after the first public passenger-carrying railway was finished (1825), forward-thinking Britishers proposed and designed tunnels under the English Channel. Always the plans were nipped by timorous Tories† with the same excuse: a Channel tunnel would rob Britain of her sacred isolation. In case of war some future William the Conqueror might march through the tunnel, instantly flood Britain with a French army.

In 1867 a French engineer, one J. A. Thome de Gamond, exhibited the first practical drawings for a Channel Tunnel. In 1875 tne Gunnel Tunnel Co. (still in existence) was organized. Queen Victoria spurred the idea by announcing: "All the women of England will bless the builder of the tunnel for saving them from seasickness," Preliminary borings were actually started. From the chalk cliffs of Dover and from the French shore near Sangatte, mile-long galleries were driven out under the Channel floor. Proving the theory of Engineer de Gamond that the Dover chalk beds run out under the Channel, these abandoned galleries are still bone dry, impervious, free from fissures.

In 1883, largely because of a screaming campaign conducted by the London Times, the tunnel project was defeated in Parliament. To pacify the militarists the tunnel plans were redrawn to include two dips, one on the French side, one on the British. In case of war these could be instantly flooded with sea water. In 1914 the Channel tunnel again came before Parliament. Two weeks before war was declared the project was suddenly quashed by the Committee of Imperial Defense.

Airplanes, long range guns, the intricacies of modern warfare have made military objections to the tunnel rather silly. Apart from the glaring advantages of direct communication with the Continent, unemployment in Britain has made the tunnel project a favorite with politicians. One of the last acts of the Conservative Government of Stanley Baldwin was the appointment of the Commission which last week made its report.

The recommendations:

1) Let a "pilot tunnel" be driven across the Channel at once at an estimated cost of $25,000,000 to test the geological and engineering problems involved. This pilot tunnel later to become a drainage and ventilator tube for the two main traffic tunnels.

2) If the pilot tunnel proves successful, contract for the main tunnels, at an estimated additional cost of $125,000,000 to be awarded to private enterprise with an understanding that the operating company would not charge much more than $5 per passenger for the 20-mile tunnel ride.