Plans Approved to Transform Wartime Kingsway Tunnels

The City of London unanimously approved the proposals to change the use of the deep-level subterranean wartime shelter tunnels 40m below High Holborn into a visitor and cultural attraction on 11^th June with the London Borough of Camden approving the same on 11^th July.

G&T is providing Project Management, Employer’s Agent and CDM Client Advisor services on the scheme which will contribute to the City Corporation’s ‘Destination City’ policy and forms part of Camden’s ‘Holborn Vision’.

The underground experience will be transformed to provide historical heritage experiences alongside a cultural, multi-sensory digital experience.  This will preserve the historical importance of the Kingsway Exchange Tunnels and provide economic benefits to the local area.

The tunnels comprise 8,000m² of passageways, together a mile long and the width of three London buses. Up to 2m visitors a year will have the chance to explore this subterranean secret world.

Kept secret for nearly 70 years, the tunnels were originally built in the 1940s as shelter for Londoners during the Blitz. They have since served as the home of the Special Operations Executive (the real-life location of James Bond’s Q Branch), an international communications exchange used during the Cold War and was once the deepest licensed bar in London used by nearly 200 government workers.

^{All images: © WEA}