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There were two 2014 reunions. In April a tour of the Mersey Tunnel and a meal at Marco Pierre White's restaurant in Hotel Indigo. Photos below In November a meal at The Monro, Duke Street. Photos here |
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Photos of the April reunion. |
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 Left to right: Mike Kirk, Graham Murphy, Peter Lloyd, Brian Swift, Colin Scales, Alastair Caird & John Gillies. |
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| The Georges Dock Building with the three Graces. | ||
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| Statue outside the Georges Dock Building | Large carved feature on the side of the building. The father of our colleague Alastair Caird worked on this and many other carvings around the city. | |
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| In the control room Georges Dock Building.
The two staff on duty look after both tunnels and are in constant touch with the tunnel police control room in Birkenhead. |
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| These are the computers used
to display all the technical functions within
both tunnels. |
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| The panels in the background
were the original controls used before the
system was computerised. |
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| Inside one of the
original fan chambers |
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| The building
was constructed around the motor and fan. The
bearing is the only part so far requiring
replacement. |
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| As traffic increased
more ventilation was necessary so these two
additional fans were installed. Only one is used
at a time so they move on rails to mount over
the ventilation shaft. |
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| The tunnel building
was constructed on the site of the old Georges
Dock. This photograph shows a chamber
under Brunswick St the road between the
tunnel building and the Cunard Building. The
roadway is supported by vaults such as that
shown at the top of
the photograph which originally formed a bridge
over the dock. The bed of the dock is 30 feet
below the platform we were standing on and is still
covered by river water. The hole in the
wall on the left behind our guide provides a
view into the next chamber. ( see below) |
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| The view into the
next chamber. |
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| This shows the
construction of the Cunard Building in 1913. It
includes the chambers under Brunswick St as shown in the photographs above. |
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| Part of
the original dock wall and an original timber. |
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| Inside one of the
side tunnels used in the construction of
the Queensway Tunnel now used to access the main
tunnel for maintenance. |
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Doorway into the main
tunnel showing the roadway. Diagram showing how the tunnel was originally planned with the trams. The photographs below show us in both the fresh air duct and central section. |
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| This is the section
of the tunnel below the roadway, the curved metal
plates forming the skin of the tube can be seen
on the left. |
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| The part of the
tunnel below the roadway is divided into three
sections. The previous photograph shows one of
the two side sections with curved walls, this is
the central wider section, known as Central
Avenue, which was originally
to have had trams running through it. This never
happened and it is now used for power and
communication cables. |
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| A number of 'refuge
areas' have been built below the roadway to
provide safe areas in case of emergencies.
Members of the public would wait inside until
the emergency services take them out through the
door shown into the lower section of the tunnel
for evacuation. |
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| This is the
inside of a 'refuge area'. The public would
enter through the green door at the end and wait
to be rescued. The blue door leads to a toilet
and there is cctv and a communications system so
the tunnel police can advise of progress. The
air pressure inside the refuge is kept higher
than that in the main tunnel to prevent smoke
entering the room. |
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| The
communication system inside one of the 'refuge
areas'. |
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| Refugees from
Marlborough plus others in the refuge! |
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There is a short video of the visit.
Click on the arrow in the centre of the
photograph below to start it. If you have a problem viewing the video it can be seen on Youtube here
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| The November reunion was held in The Monro, Duke Street. |
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| Clockwise from bottom left. Charles Vailant, Graham Murphy, Ray Christian, Alastair Caird, Colin Scales, Peter Lloyd, Mike Kirk, John Millin, Alan Jones, John Gillies. |
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| Clockwise from bottom left. Charles Vailant, Graham Murphy, Ray Christian, Alastair Caird, Colin Scales, Peter Lloyd, Mike Kirk, John Millin, Alan Jones, Doug Brady. |
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John Millin, shown nearest in the photograph above, gave a spirited rendering of the school song at the November reunion. It can be heard in the video below. |
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