What the english version of this wikipedia article doesn't mention (the german version does) is that the usage of this tunnel shifted a lot in recent years.
Today it's a very important bike route for people living south of the river Elbe (especially in the districts Wilhelmsburg and Veddel, both experienced heavy gentrification in the last two decades).
While the english version only states yearly usage numbers for 2008 (300k cars, 63k bikes, 700k pedestrians) the german also has numbers for 2018 (52k cars, 300k bikes, > 1 million pedestrians).
In my own experience the pedestrians are mostly tourists and the cars people working at the shipyards south of the river Elbe.
I witnessed a lot of conflicts between pedestrians for which crossing the tunnel is some kind of special experience getting in the way of cyclist which just want to get from one side of the river to the other as quickly as possible. There are sidewalks on both sides of each tube but tourists don't care much.
But I guess this is kind of inevitable if such a curiosity is part of the daily used traffic infrastructure.
Wondering if it was used for wartime production, for protection from bombings.
German aircraft production increased each month right up until substantial homeland territory was lost, apparently unaffected by massive bombing. Given its military futility, most of the bombing should probably be considered war crime. Air crews' lives were squandered.
I've been there. It's very f*** cool. It's sort of like the old underground metro subway stations in Sydney australia. You know the old circular key line with Martin place museum Hyde Park these type of stations on them? I can't remember all the names now but they have that old tiling and the long pedestrian tunnels and I mean just a fantastic kind of vibe to go into them and this tunnel is like that but it goes under the water.
I think there might be a similar tunnel in Antwerp, Belgium (great city, awesome Jewish bakeries) I seem to recall having transited such a place in that region too.
Of German tunnels I've always found the Zugspitzbahn impressive. The last section is a tunnel through the highest mountain of Germany and ends 300 meters below the summit.
Was interesting to go through, the tiling is old school, and they've preserved the old car lifts, they're positively Steam Age looking steel girder contraptions.
However, for true balls, you have to look at the French who completed the incredible Haiphong to Kunming railway, mainly to extract tin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunming%E2%80%93Haiphong_railw... Incidentally, I just purchased some bulk solder which is still being produced from Yunnanese tin today. The town was mined so heavily the center collapsed and turned in to a craterous water feature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gejiu There's a mining company museum which features an early computer imported from the US (I have photos somewhere), possibly off the back of US-China anti-Japan collaboration during WWII, which was significant in the area. How times change!
The English of course wouldn't have it and tried to beat the frogs by bringing a line in from Myanmar with the support of the US but failed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yunnan%E2%80%93Burma_railway You can read the minutes of them pompously pontificating in London. It would make a great film, IMHO. China has recently rebuilt the French line as a high speed line to the border, from which travelers may appreciate the relative infrastructure fail that is north Vietnam.
There's something about underground infrastructure that really intrigues me, despite how claustrophobic it can feel if I start thinking about what lies above.
I find it really interesting in this tunnel there are lifts for cars, because the entrance/exit points are vertical drops to the tunnel.
Biked through the tunnel, then ran over the Köhlbrandbrücke the one time a year they let you do that. The fun one can have pointlessly crossing a river (:.
While it has low capacity and was "replaced" with other ways to cross the Elbe, it still helps ease traffic across the river, other roads and bridges are often very packed or even blocked (often WW2 bomb defusals). I have lived both in NYC and in Hamburg and while the scale in Hamburg is way smaller, the type of traffic is kinda similar. Btw, isn't the Holland tunnel from NJ to Manhattan also free?
Also, we generally don't have tolls anywhere in Germany. If we do I have a hard time thinking of examples. Our taxes are (too) heavily invested in road infrastructure anyways and the tunnel isn't privately owned.
Right now the "Alte Elbtunnel" is undergoing maintenance in one of the two tunnels. Since as long as I've lived here, it hasn't been open to cars, but the large elevators previously used for cars are still serving bicyclists and pedestrians during the daytime. They get quite full during rush hour.
Many of the older subway stations in the upper part of Manhattan were built in the same time period and have a very similar architectural style, down to the tiled walls and the ornate molding, but they look absolutely decrepit. The tile is stained with dirt and grime. The molding is broken in places.
For most people who pass through one of these stations (which are pretty busy), their general impression is that the stations look cheap and dirty. You wouldn't really notice how lavish the decorations in these stations must have been at opening unless you were paying particular attention to your surroundings. It's sad how little the US has invested in maintaining its public transit infrastructure compared to other countries.
> It's sad how little the US has invested in maintaining its public transit infrastructure compared to other countries.
I'm on the fence about this, on average across the US, I'd agree. But where we do have decent transit, we seem to spend a lot. The NY MTA will spend $18B[1] in total in 2022, more than 6x the amount the state spends on all state roads in NY for 2018[2]. Despite this amount of money being spent, we have the general problems that you mention above, plus the fact that any expansion is prohibitively expensive. I just have to wonder, even if a lot more money were spent, would we actually see proportional improvements?
It's tempting to see it that way, but I read your comment and see an unfair comparison between a small city and the largest in the United States. The MTA is ugly (I love it) but let's not kid ourselves, they spend a shitload of money maintaining nearly 500 stations, probably the yearly cost of that tunnel per day.
The (at least the older original) stations of the Moscow metro are likewise individual works of art. The pure plain utilitarianism of modern stations in NYC or the London Underground are sterile and boring in comparison.
[+] [-] schlowmo|3 years ago|reply
Today it's a very important bike route for people living south of the river Elbe (especially in the districts Wilhelmsburg and Veddel, both experienced heavy gentrification in the last two decades).
While the english version only states yearly usage numbers for 2008 (300k cars, 63k bikes, 700k pedestrians) the german also has numbers for 2018 (52k cars, 300k bikes, > 1 million pedestrians).
In my own experience the pedestrians are mostly tourists and the cars people working at the shipyards south of the river Elbe.
I witnessed a lot of conflicts between pedestrians for which crossing the tunnel is some kind of special experience getting in the way of cyclist which just want to get from one side of the river to the other as quickly as possible. There are sidewalks on both sides of each tube but tourists don't care much.
But I guess this is kind of inevitable if such a curiosity is part of the daily used traffic infrastructure.
[+] [-] ncmncm|3 years ago|reply
German aircraft production increased each month right up until substantial homeland territory was lost, apparently unaffected by massive bombing. Given its military futility, most of the bombing should probably be considered war crime. Air crews' lives were squandered.
[+] [-] graderjs|3 years ago|reply
I think there might be a similar tunnel in Antwerp, Belgium (great city, awesome Jewish bakeries) I seem to recall having transited such a place in that region too.
[+] [-] tchvil|3 years ago|reply
The wooden escalator is impressive still working after so many years.
[+] [-] padraigcoogan|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] neuronic|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] microtonal|3 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bavarian_Zugspitze_Railway
[+] [-] EdwardDiego|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JonathonW|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Stamp01|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] contingencies|3 years ago|reply
However, for true balls, you have to look at the French who completed the incredible Haiphong to Kunming railway, mainly to extract tin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunming%E2%80%93Haiphong_railw... Incidentally, I just purchased some bulk solder which is still being produced from Yunnanese tin today. The town was mined so heavily the center collapsed and turned in to a craterous water feature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gejiu There's a mining company museum which features an early computer imported from the US (I have photos somewhere), possibly off the back of US-China anti-Japan collaboration during WWII, which was significant in the area. How times change!
The English of course wouldn't have it and tried to beat the frogs by bringing a line in from Myanmar with the support of the US but failed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yunnan%E2%80%93Burma_railway You can read the minutes of them pompously pontificating in London. It would make a great film, IMHO. China has recently rebuilt the French line as a high speed line to the border, from which travelers may appreciate the relative infrastructure fail that is north Vietnam.
[+] [-] contingencies|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fritztastic|3 years ago|reply
I find it really interesting in this tunnel there are lifts for cars, because the entrance/exit points are vertical drops to the tunnel.
[+] [-] rongopo|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] valenterry|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bradhe|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Elte|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lexicality|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rongopo|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] neuronic|3 years ago|reply
Also, we generally don't have tolls anywhere in Germany. If we do I have a hard time thinking of examples. Our taxes are (too) heavily invested in road infrastructure anyways and the tunnel isn't privately owned.
[+] [-] narrowtux|3 years ago|reply
I use the tunnel 3-4 times per week!
[+] [-] Calavar|3 years ago|reply
For most people who pass through one of these stations (which are pretty busy), their general impression is that the stations look cheap and dirty. You wouldn't really notice how lavish the decorations in these stations must have been at opening unless you were paying particular attention to your surroundings. It's sad how little the US has invested in maintaining its public transit infrastructure compared to other countries.
[+] [-] xhrpost|3 years ago|reply
I'm on the fence about this, on average across the US, I'd agree. But where we do have decent transit, we seem to spend a lot. The NY MTA will spend $18B[1] in total in 2022, more than 6x the amount the state spends on all state roads in NY for 2018[2]. Despite this amount of money being spent, we have the general problems that you mention above, plus the fact that any expansion is prohibitively expensive. I just have to wonder, even if a lot more money were spent, would we actually see proportional improvements?
[1] https://www.osc.state.ny.us/files/reports/osdc/pdf/report-10...
[2] https://cbcny.org/research/building-sound-fiscal-future-new-...
[+] [-] edavison1|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Arrath|3 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] Avalaxy|3 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] mftb|3 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] soperj|3 years ago|reply